


Depravity

by KR Grim (KR_Grim)



Category: Homestuck
Genre: F/M, First Person, Immolation, Slavery, Torture, Vivisection, third person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-11
Updated: 2011-06-28
Packaged: 2017-10-16 21:23:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 13
Words: 30,567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/169499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KR_Grim/pseuds/KR%20Grim
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Depravity: n, perversion of the moral faculties; corruption, viciousness, abandoned wickedness. (OED)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Pain

**Author's Note:**

> This started off as me just wanting to write out some gratuitous torture. It morphed into Homestuck fanfic. I'm not sure whether to say "Enjoy" or "I'm sorry", so... I guess both. Enjoy. I'm sorry.
> 
> Also I think this is the first instance of Gorn Without Plot in this section of the AO3.

The whole point was death. That was what he had been taught, what he had tried to emulate. And for a while he had been successful. Murder… If he thought back, he could remember the sweet sight of flowing blood, the futile resistance of a windpipe gasping for air it would never receive. It was beautiful. But then they had stopped him. And now she was in charge.

He had been chained, once. Those were the days when she had been alone, when she had administered his “punishment” on her own. He no longer needed the chains. His psyche, broken and twisted as it was, recognized the futility of escape, and gave in to despair.

He looked over her form. She, unlike he, was human, and her pale skin looked almost white in the strange dungeon’s light. It was an unnatural illumination of an unnatural paleness; no being he had seen before had ever been so pale. The mammalian paleness shocked and frightened him.

Her skin struck a contrast with her black hair, which pooled around her neck and face like a strange tangled mess of liquid wires. The mass of hair served only one purpose — to draw his attention away from the gray jumpsuit and towards her face. Green eyes, with irises that looked like someone had frozen broccoli and placed it on a human statuette. A sharp lump of cartilage, affixed to her face and marring it as so many human extremities did to their owners’ bodies. And her mouth was a thin smile, her lips pressed together to create a tight, almost-acceptable appearance. He shuddered.

He forced his attention away from her face, down to her hand. The talons of her left hand were long and sharp, and curved like strange knives. She smiled at him, leaning into his face. She opened her mouth slightly, and he could see a few teeth poking out. Though they were mostly square-bottomed, two were pointed, and these two frightened him. After all, they were so much like his.

Oh, how he would have loved to have ended this now. He could have, he knew; hers was no powerful race. But the idea of her, the meekest of her kind, destroying him so utterly… A small grin traced his face.

She began with his left eye. Her strange devices forced it open, peeled the eyelid back to the point of utter pain as his blood began to flow from the tightly-wound lid. A few sharp blasts from the hose stopped the bleeding, though. They always did. And then she would proceed to mark the eyeball. Her talons were delicate, delightful, fruitful. First the one symbol, then the other. During their first session, he had been tied, and he had screamed. He had called for her to stop.

Now, as the yellow ran down his face, he did no such thing. It would have been pointless. She wouldn’t have stopped. She hadn’t the first time. By now the scars on his eye would be permanent. The strange backwards runes were everywhere. At least, everywhere he could see.

The job was done there, for today. He had to suppress a laugh in his throat. She moved on to his right eye, using only her sharpened nail to cut through the eyelid. This move wasn’t her usual practice. Usually she would simply wind the eyelid up as she did the other. He screamed, for the first time in sessions. She paused, smiling as she carefully wiped the blood off his eyeball, which stared at her finger, not daring to stop its gaze. Not that it could, even with the continued bloodflow. Facial wounds, after all, bled like crazy. She smiled.

“Shirt off, now,” she whispered. He pulled it up, over his head, over his horns. She looked over him. She could see his scars, from where others had fought him, from where others had fought their doom. She walked over to a tray her assistant carried. She took from it a scalpel. He paused. Was she planning on re-opening his scars again, as she’d done at the first session?

Pain tore into him as she pressed the scalpel’s blade to his horn. True, it was made of tougher stuff than she would have anticipated, but… He felt it dig in. He heard her audible gasp as it began to bleed. He should have laughed, should have told her that trolls bled from their horns when they were beaten or snapped or broken. He should have told her, that would have horrified her, and maybe the first session would never have happened.

Pain surged through his horn again. She had hit the bone, and was now cutting around it. He reached up a hand to stop her. In an instant, her assistant had restrained it. Lovely. It was the one who was male, and who looked like her, but with eyes of blue. He could not move, could not scream, as she finished her slow, methodical cut. She walked over to her assistant again as blood ran down his cheek. Slowly, he laughed. In another time, this would have excited and amused him. Oh, what a joke this all was, oh how laughable.

The bonesaw was in her hand now, though she still had the bloodied scalpel. As the bonesaw bit into the horn-bone, he couldn’t help but scream. The bone itself had begun cracking. The pain probably wasn’t any more real than his right eyelids’s had been — was probably less real, in fact — but it hurt all the same, it hurt as she cut into the center of the bone, sliced through the marrow, pushed her way through the rear sponge. The top of the horn came off as clean as it could and fell to the floor with a thunk, some marrow spilling from the center. She took a cautious lick from the outside of the horn, as if the fact that it had landed on the floor was irrelevant.

“Tastes like candy corn,” she said, the sarcasm running thick in her voice. “Let’s try dipping it in special sauce.” She dipped the tip in the freshly-exposed horn marrow, pulling out a horntip covered in a substance the same color as the blood that flowed through his veins. But when she brought it to her mouth, instead of licking it, she gnawed on the damn thing, chewing off the keratin.

He couldn’t tell her what he wanted to, what she meant to him. But this was only partly because he didn’t know. He suspected that hate was a necessary part of it, but at the moment, pain was his only concern. Pain, and trying to avoid it.

“Ah-ah-ah,” she said, and the hose fired again, spraying his face with ice water and knocking out three fangs, which she quickly collected. “No falling asleep, no matter how tiring I get.” She gripped one of the fangs by its roots and dragged it across his chest. She pressed it hard into his skin as she carved a rough circle around a sensitive spot. She laughed a little. “You know, trolls don’t need nipples… especially not boy trolls.” The fang dug deeper. He was being maimed with his own body parts. His own fang was being used as the scalpel that removed his nipples.

Eventually, she finished, and he chanced a look down at her handiwork. It looked like his chest was crying blood, as two thick rivulets of the stuff poured down his chest, staining his pants. He prided himself on not screaming once during the interval, even though it would have been acceptable for anyone else. But not for him. No, never for him.

Her finger traced down his chest, lightly scratching with her fingernail (her grotesque, far-too-long fingernail, which seemed to serve no purpose). Upon reaching the hem of his pants, she paused. He prayed she wouldn’t remove them. That would be frightening.

It was then that she turned her attention to his left hand. That was, after all, the most important direction. It was the holiest one, too, by his outdated standard. He felt her scratch the inside of his left palm. Once. Twice. Five times, ten times. In her hands the scalpel worked wonders, never rusting in the pooling blood or losing an edge to his tough hide.

The scalpel reached deep as she continued up his fingers. It was not strong enough to cut bone, but it snapped ligaments like so many rubber bands, stretched thin before they were severed by a knife. Bone by bone, his fingers collapsed into useless pain-sources. But he could withstand it. Just because she had mutilated one hand, and would probably mutilate the other, did not mean that he would fall. Not here, not to this.

She smiled, and stood, and walked over to her assistant. Her tools were taken, and she was presented with a fresh scalpel and a pair of tweezers. His right hand scrambled, trying to find the cut off piece of horn through the pain. Perhaps it could be reattached if he just placed it on the —

She had returned. A damp towel mopped up the blood in his wounds, stinging slightly with the bearable sting of clean water. He could see again, as clearly as ever. His horn was in the hands of her associate. And her hand was moving towards his unmarred eyeball.

His eyelid tried to flutter closed, aware for the first time in a long while that it couldn’t. Her fingernails gripped the orb and gently pried it partway from its socket. He wanted to scream, wanted to call her a twisted, psychotic bitch. But he couldn’t, though whether by now it was his pride or sheer exhaustion was debatable.

At a certain amount of extension, her fingers released the eyeball, replaced by the tweezers’ viselike grip on the optic nerve. The nerve screamed as she stretched it further, roaring with pain. His eye frantically turned to see what was going on. And it was then that the scalpel was again used in a spectacularly wrong fashion. It was a scalpel, not a saw. The up-and-down (or was it left-and-right?) motion as it sawed off his optic nerve was painful not only for its actions, but because he knew what it was for.

She returned to her assistant, his now-useless right eye lying next to his horn. He reached for them, but her accomplice restrained him again. She laughed as she grabbed her new tools and walked over to him. “Ah-ah-ah,” she said, grinning. “Bad boys don’t get to keep themselves intact.”

He wanted to respond. He wanted to tell her that he hadn’t been intact for years. He wanted to explain, in excruciating detail, what had happened to him. But the most he could manage was a choked sob. She smiled as she brandished another scalpel, as well as a pair of surgical tongs.

“Assistant.” He was suddenly pinned, held down, neck exposed. She drew a line with the scalpel, consulting a book she’d perhaps picked up in her travels. Or perhaps she’d found it here. It didn’t really matter. She peeled apart the layers of flesh, opening his throat wide before carefully and methodically slicing out his vocal cords. A needle and thread sewed him back up admirably.

He could no longer scream. He watched in silent awe as she pulled the remainder of his clothes offShe then called her assistant over. From his proffered table, she took a paintbrush, a can of oil, and a box of matches. Slowly, painstakingly, she used the oil to create a pattern on his bodyIt skirted some wounds while others were marked for cauterization. His right eye socket, in particular, was coated with oil. The brush made his cavity itch.

And down the brush went, down along his legs, covering them in spirals and curlicues, tracing down the outside and back up the inseam, up to…

The gentle caress of the brush on his genitalia was almost erotic. It was the first pleasurable sensation of the whole session, and he allowed himself to betray it. As his penis grew more erect, she painted smaller, more intricate designs on it with the oil. The highly flammable oil.

Despite his sudden terror, his erection adamantly refused to shrink. Not while the brush continued its gentle attentions. Not even as she single-handedly lit the match and dropped it on the bridge of his nose. The fire spread quickly, burning flesh away, causing bubbling black injuries instead of cauterizing wounds. Even his manhood screamed for surcease of pain from the flames even as the pain spurred him to heights of perverse pleasure. His heart pounded, screaming at him to leave, but he couldn’t, he was being held town…

And now, his burning left leg was being lifted high into the air, and something was approaching it, something vaguely sickle-like. And now it had sliced through his achilles tendon, and the pain, on top of the fire, was too much to bear, even as the flames reached the wound, cauterizing it. She grinned at him. The flames winked out almost as she willed them. He dipped a hand into the still-smoldering bleeding burns on his chest. His right hand was still intact. He wrote two words in his own blood as she stood up, admiring her handiwork.

She had the audacity to laugh at him after he had done so. “Perhaps,” she said. “But then again… so were you, once upon a time. Brother?”

“Right behind you, Sister.” The second human grinned. “Oh, almost forgot to give him his mirror!” The human boy gave the poor, half-horned troll his mirror back. It was a thing of vanity, as tall as he had been. He looked in the mirror as the two humans left the room, giggling about what they’d done as if he were some video game. He could see the blood dripping from his wounds, even the ones that had supposedly cauterized. The remains of white make-up were smeared with ash and blood — but not the blood of others. No, this blood was all his.

He whined to himself, because nobody kept watch over him anymore. The one lotion for his constant misery, and he was forever denied it because it was no more. The slime was gone, brothers and sisters of the dark miracle. And the new truth? Well, that was the truth that J.H. had burned into him. He looked into the mirror, where it was reflected perfectly on his chest. “No more miracles, Gamzee,” it whispered. “Not for you.”

***

John had accompanied his sister on these excursions several times. He tried to remind himself that she was still a good person. But when it got hard, he remembered what she’d told him the first time he’d come with her.

“John, I never hurt my friends. That’s the first thing about being friends. You don’t hurt them.” Her gaze had turned black at that point. “Gamzee hurt my friends. Gamzee isn’t my friend. And I can’t let him die, because if he did… he’d hurt my dead friends. This is the only way to keep him from hurting anyone. I have to fix him.”


	2. Curiosity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vivisection: n, the action of cutting or dissecting some part of a living organism; specifically the action or practice of performing dissection, or other painful experiment, upon living animals as a method of physiological or pathological study. (OED)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I kinda hate myself for what I'm doing to Sollux in this chapter. Also, this begins sowing the seeds of an actual plot thread that arcs its way through here in a winding path of trauma and horror. A difficult-to-write path. Especially with chapter 3, which I somehow completed (don't ask me how; it was almost physically painful to write, and the reason why will become apparent once it's been posted.)
> 
> At any rate, here's chapter 2.

I still have the powers. She wasn’t able to take them away — not that she didn’t try so damn hard I couldn’t bear it, practically. She said I ran away. That was what she told KK. Ran off into a corner of the Veil and got fucking lost, wound up dying to Jack Noir.

She never talks to Terezi, I think. It’d be a good thing if she did, then I might finally be freed. Terezi told me once she could smell lies. After seeing her nose in action, I believe her.

But the door opens and it’s her, her and Egbert, who’s always with her when she can’t pry him away from Vriska. At least, that’s what she tells me. It’s probably true, he’s probably keeping Vriska from running off and facing him.

And the first tools I feel aren’t really tools. But, same as always, I feel her tie me to the vivisecting pad. She’s already dissected all the dead trolls over and over again, I think. She knows how most of us tick. But Egbert is protecting Serket, and I’m the only living psychic left.

Well. The only living psychic who isn’t her friend. So she’s antipathetic towards me. My burned-out eye sockets focus on her, and my nose, poor as it is at smell-o-vision, can still pick out where she is and what she’s holding. Every session begins the same way. She holds the bone saw eagerly and looks through my hair, trying to see if the horn stumps had grown back. They never have, because troll horns stop growing when they become damaged because we’re built on a fair few sound principles. But she keeps hoping, and I guess she takes that hope out on me.

The bone saw gets put away, and out comes the scalpel. Today it appears she’s researching my arms again as she takes one and slices it open. It’s split like a ripe peach, and by now I’m used to her cataloguing of every muscle.

The removal is new, though. Muscle by muscle, she toes through and removes about half my left arm, followed by half my right. She sews me back up, but I feel strangely empty and deflated. It isn’t even that she rendered the arm useless — which she probably hadn’t, pain of use was her main turn-on. It just looks wrong for an arm.

Before I can object, she’s done the same thing with my other arm. Not that I can really object beyond a muffled groan. I’ve heard the screams my neighbor used to give. He doesn’t scream anymore, it’s more of a high-pitched whine, so I’m thankful for my ability to gargle out muffled gasps of anguish through the gag and the strap biting into my wind pipe.

She continues to my legs. I’ll have to relearn how to walk, and knowing Harley, she’ll demand it before I can get my food. Onto the chest, the abdomen, the back. By the time she’s done filleting me like a fish, half my muscles are gone and I’m a mass of stitches. But at least I still have my psychic powers. She can’t take those from me. Not without some very precise…

She cuts open my skull and takes a look at my brain. I had forgotten that she was the WItch of Space. If she knew which parts of my brain did what from her autopsies of Tavros’s, and the dissection of the other brains… with help from Terezi or Kanaya or someone like them…

The scalpel begins playing with my brain. It dips into the Occipital lobe, deftly cutting out my sense of color. It swings into the Temporal lobe, neatly scooping out most of my ability to speak. I could still cry out without words, though. Finally, I feel her do two last things. The first destroys any psychic ability I had ever had, tearing out the piece of brain that had been responsible for my abnormality. The second is a strange snipping sensation. It seems to do nothing, which makes me all the more afraid.

But in the meantime, she isn’t done. She grabs something else, I can’t tell what, from Egbert’s waiting tray, and shoves them into my eye sockets before fusing the metallics into my brain. Two small cameras activate. I can see again. The world is a grainy black-and-white, and the eyes are likely pilfered from a robot part pile, but… Mother of miracles, I can see.

She laughs at me. “Hello, Sollux. Can you hear me?” My understanding is perfect. I look helplessly at her for a minute before I try to form words around the gag.

“R… Bbbrrr…. khl…” A trail of drool drips down my front. I try to say the one word I can. Egbert takes a step towards me.

“Stop. If you want it off him, do the windy thing.” John shudders and complies, allowing the Breeze to unhook this wretched gag and pull it from my mouth. “Well, Sollux? Are you happy? Do you like the gift I have given you for being a good patient?”

I cough. I can feel my brain drying out; she still holds the top of my head in her hand. “Y-yuh… yuh-yes. G-good… y-yes… y-yes.” I’m trying to say more, something, anything, but the only word that’s coming easily at all is “yes”, so I keep saying it. Jade laughs.

“Pitiful,” she sneers as she unties me. “Still, I suppose that was informative. And a source of meat, albeit stringy.” Jade begins to walk out. This is my last chance, even as I’m a sobbing wreck on the floor.

“Y-yes… yes… w-want… yes… k… k…” It look at her, frantically pulling myself closer to the door, not caring that I’m pulling out stitches. “W-want… K… K…” I want to scream “Bring me karkat, you pailsmashing grubfisted douche!” I want my old command of language back.

Jade laughs, opens the door, and closes it behind her. John looks at me with a mix of revulsion and pity. I look plaintively at him “W-want…” It’s not the word I want, but he seems to get the message.

“Once Vriska is safe,” says Egbert. “We’ll find Dave and Aradia, and we’ll get you back to the way you were, back when you were whole.” He nodded, as if it were a promise. “Once Vriska isn’t in any more danger.”

“Yes… good K.” I know it doesn’t make any sense to him, but… perhaps this will remind him to bring Karkat and Terezi.


	3. Forbidden

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rape: n, Violation or ravishing of a woman. Also, in moderate usage, sexual assault upon a man.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **WARNING: THIS CHAPTER MAY CONTAIN TRIGGERS FOR RAPE VICTIMS. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK.**
> 
> This was the hardest chapter for me to write, at least in part because I felt like it might be insensitive. I've tried my best to depict this horrid act as the psychologically traumatic event it is, although whether or not I've succeeded in displaying both the proper gravitas and the proper amount of horribleness I leave up to you, the reader. In addition, the difficulty of writing this chapter was due to my extreme discomfort with thinking about this act, and my personal conviction that those who commit violent sexual crimes, whether against adults or children, should be punished in ways that I believe the U.S. Constitution would disallow under the eighth amendment (the one that forbids cruel and unusual punishment, although I'd argue that anything I did to them wouldn't be as cruel as the crime they committed). Rape is not a matter to be taken lightly, and I ask you to trust me that it will not be taken lightly in this story as I move forward.
> 
> Again, I wish to reiterate that **I do not, in _any_ way, condone rape, sexual assault, or other violent sexual crimes.**

Vriska knew, when he entered the room again, that something had happened to John. It wasn’t the normal horrors about his sister. Seeing Gamzee, or Sollux, or Kanaya, all in her grasp… it was almost unbearable. And he had seen all three. Had seen what she had done to them, what she would have done to Vriska if she’d had half the chance… or if she hadn’t cared about her brother so much.

But those, he could stand. Those horrors he’d lived through. He’d become stronger than her by surviving them. This time… She looked at him, as he stumbled into the room. Something was different. His clothes were more rumbled than usual. His glasses were broken. He was bleeding from his wrists and ankles, bleeding that candy-red blood that Terezi always fawned over.

Something was wrong. And Vriska was going to find out what. She looked at him, took a step towards him. His eyes were hollow. He looked at her, scared out of his wits. “John?”

John backed up toward the door. “D-don’t… d-don’t touch me,” he gasped. Vriska stepped back, her hands anxiously in front of her chest. “D-don’t look at me! G-get out! GET OUT!” Vriska took another few steps back as the Breeze began flying around the room, picking up light objects in a sort of hurricane. Vriska was too lucky to get hit by anything too heavy, but a few dolls hit her in the face.

She grabbed one out of the air. “John… what did Jade do?” John sniffed. Vriska’s fear crept further into her voice. “John… what happened? Please. Please tell me. Did she kill someone?” John shook his head.

“She… sh-she…” John’s hands went to the hem of his shirt, pulling it down over his pants. Wheels in Vriska’s head began turning. Wheels that reminded her uncomfortably of Mindfang now that her matesprit had been… Had she really admired her Ancestor for doing those things? Her stomach turned. Her desires were set aside. John wouldn’t want that. Not after what had happened.

“John… she forced herself on you, didn’t she?” John blanched, but nodded. Vriska stayed across the room. “Can you tell me what happened?”

John took a deep in-breath. Vriska had a feeling this was going to be a long story.

***

The fifth vivisection of Kanaya since they’d returned to the asteroid had concluded. Jade had given her a bucket of Gamzee’s blood as a reward for her screams, and John had been, as usual, disturbed beyond belief at his sister’s depravity. She was going to kill one of these days, and he had a feeling he was going to be at the top of the list. After all, once she began killing, she’d keep alive only one person, and then for breeding purposes. And he had a feeling she wasn’t going to begin incesting any earlier than necessary.

“Oh, John, we need to stop by my room.” Those words were frightening. Not because Jade’s room was filled with gore or blood or guts. No, her room was actually somewhat normal for her. It was green, filled with pictures of animals and plants and all sorts of machine type devices. It looked, for lack of a better word, normal.

John had been in there twice before, never for a really good reason. First, she had previewed four different labcoats for him. The labcoats had always struck him as a bit of a lie, given how she wasn’t really doing science. She was just messing with others. The second time, she’d asked him to come in and help her clean off her tools. It had ended up with John doing all the cleaning and Jade getting into her pyjamas… but not before spending an amount of time naked that had made him _horribly_ uncomfortable.

This time, she entered behind him, closed the door, and locked it. John didn’t like the sound the lock made, and when he tried to open it, the handle zapped him before saying “Incorrect identification, please try again.” He wasn’t eager to try it a second time. Especially since Jade was calling him over to her experiment desk. He walked over.

As soon as he got there, Jade forced a rag in his face. It smelled unusual, but he couldn’t figure it out. Not until Jade said, “Why, John. I had no idea you liked the smell of ether.” It was about there that he passed out.

When he came to, ropes were tying him to the bed. Ropes with complex knots, knots that the Breeze wouldn’t be able to undo without at least an hour of sustained work. And the knots were itchy as well. This distracted John for at least half a minute from the other change in his situation. That change was a lack of clothing. Here he was, tied to his sister’s bed, stark naked. And she had just finished removing her clothes. “Finally awake, hm?” She grinned, bouncing over to him. “About time, breezy brother.”

“Jade, what… why…” Jade laughed.

“Because I love you, John!” Her voice had no right being that cheerful. “I love you and I want to show you just how much!” Her hand moved to his penis, and she began playing with the flaccid organ. “You know, all this play with the trolls has led me to understand a little bit about how to get a boy excited.” She crawled onto the bed; John couldn’t help but get a bit harder when he saw her snatch. She grinned, rubbing against him and getting him harder as she slowly pushed a finger into his anus. His body’s reactions only filled him with more fear. He didn’t want to do this with her, but she somehow knew how to prepare his body for… for…

He was completely hard when she finally stopped her anal probing. Completely hard, and slick with her yearning juices. In one swift, smooth motion, she slammed his shaft into her waiting hole. A small amount of blood trickled out of her; she giggled. “Look at that, brother dearest! You took my first time!” John tried to free himself, the knots scraping his wrists as they slowly began to draw blood. Jade didn’t appear to notice as she began bouncing up and down, apparently enjoying the feeling of John inside her.

“Jade… we’re siblings! Brother and sister!”

“I know!” Jade’s grin was absolutely feral as she plunged him inside her again, pulling off his glasses and throwing them at the door. “I know. That’s what makes this so frustrating. You won’t love me back just because I’m your sister.” John’s blood ran cold. “So I guess I’m just going to have to take your love. Pity, that. I really do love you, John. But you don’t love me. And that _hurts_.” She clawed at his chest, making him bleed. “So I’m going to hurt you back.” She laughed raucously as she continued to thrust him up into her. “Ah… but it feels so good… do I feel good, John? Does my hole feel good on your rod?”

John was almost too frightened to respond. But he couldn’t say no. If he did, she’d kill him — or possibly she’d kill Vriska, or Gamzee, or Sollux, or one of the others. So he had to lie. “Y-yes… sister… y-you feel good…” To distract himself, he began working the breeze through the knots. It was responsive enough, even if it could only do those small things.

“Excellent… I’m almost at the edge… I’m going to pull you over with me…” She grabbed his shoulders and yanked hard. One of his arms was dislocated, the other barely avoided it but was instead treated to a crack in the wrist. She slammed down on him, forcing the whole of him inside her, and she began tightening and spasming. John couldn’t hold back, even though he desperately wanted to. “Heehee… oh, John… I wonder what our baby will look like…” She turned off him and fell asleep in her bed, lying next to him. John had to get out, had to get dressed.

The breeze finally untied the ropes, and he used it to bring his clothes over. He hurriedly got dressed, not caring that his clothes were wrinkled beyond repair.

He didn’t have time to race through the door, either. No… out the window was his best bet. Out the window, and then let the Breeze carry him back inside…

***

Vriska didn’t even try to approach him. She fired up trollian on her glasses and contacted someone who would probably be better at this anyway.

 **  
_arachnidsGrip [AG] began trolling  carcinoGeneticist [CG]_   
AG: K8rk8t.  
AG: We h8v8 8n 8merg8ncy.  
AG: G8t y8ur 8ss to J8hn’s r88m n8w.  
AG: ::::(   
CG: WHAT THE NOOKSTAINING BULGEREEK FUCK HAS GOT YOU SO UPSET?  
CG: FINALLY GET IT THROUGH YOUR HEAD THAT HARLEY’S FUCKING SNAPPED AND THAT’S WHY I’VE KEPT AWAY FROM HER?  
CG: I MEAN, GOD, THE SIGNS WERE ALL AROUND.   
AG: Sh8 j8st r8p8d J8hn.   
CG: …  
CG: FUCK.  
CG: I’LL BE RIGHT OVER.  
CG: DON’T TOUCH HIM, HE’S PROBABLY STILL TRAUMATIZED, HE NEEDS ANOTHER MAN THERE, SOMEONE TO SUPPORT HIM.  
CG: NO OFFENSE TO YOU, BUT YOU’RE A WOMAN, AND HARLEY IS TOO, AND SO HE’S PROBABLY UNCONSCIOUSLY ASSOCIATING YOU AND HER.   
AG: 8 G8T 8T J8ST G8T Y88R D8MB 8SS 8V8R H8R8 N8W K8RK8T   
CG: ALL RIGHT, I’M COMING, I’M COMING.  
CG: I’M ALMOST THERE, ACTUALLY.  
CG: I AM OPENING THE DOOR. THE HAND ON THE HANDLE IS ME.  
CG: TELL JOHN NOT TO FREAK THE FUCK OUT.   
**

Vriska looked at him. “John? I called Karkat. That’s him opening the door now.” A gray carapaced hand pushed the knob open. A pair of nubby horns attached to a slightly worried gray face pushed their way in.

“John?” The human looked at him. Karkat came in and closed the door. Vriska stood back as far as she could. “John… I’m sorry, first off, that this happened. And I know it hurts, but… I need you to tell me what she’s done. And then we need to alert Dave and Aradia so they can get back here.” John sniffed. “When they get back… we can get out of here. We can get rid of her, leave her behind.”

“B-but… she’s my s-sister, Karkat…” Karkat stared blankly at him. She had forced him to have sex with him, she had shattered his innocence over the past few days with his forced exposure to torture, had mounted lie upon lie in his malleable little brain, and he wasn’t willing to return the hurt she’d laid upon him? “I… I can’t leave her behind…”

“But she… I mean, there was all that… And then the…” Karkat couldn’t finish his sentence.

It was Vriska who stepped in with sanity, somehow, even if she did stay in the corner of the room, clutching that doll. “Why, John? Why can’t you?” He looked at her, confused. “Because you’re related by blood? If that’s the case, then I should have just let Eridan kill me because we were both formed from the same slurry and because he wanted me dead!” She stalked over to him, glaring. “My god. I helped you reach god tier because I figured you were worth it, that you had courage and power and all those things I _wish_ I had! And now here you are, complaining that you’re too cowardly to leave behind the one chain that’s holding you back!”

“B-but… Vriska, you… you don’t understand. She’s the only family I have left… and… and you never leave family behind…” Karkat growled.

“…You want to have a family to stay with?” asked Karkat. “You want family who’ll help you through your tough times? Because that bitch Harley isn’t going to be that for you. Not with the way she’s acting.” Karkat cut open his hand and grabbed John’s still-bleeding wrist. “There. We share some blood. We’re brothers. This angry, obnoxious, self-righteous prick and you are now brothers.” John looked at him. “We’re family now. I am officially your fuckwit brother who is suggesting that you kick your sister out of the family circle.” Karkat sighed. “Seriously, John. Tell me some things about earth families.”

“W-well…” John swallowed. “Y-you’re supposed to protect each other. And… help each other out with stuff. And… and you’re supposed t-to… to not hurt y-your family…” Karkat nodded.

“So… Let’s see if Jade matches your criteria. Protecting you? No, she’s actually pretty much done the opposite. She’s exposed you to a hell of a lot of harm, if what you’ve said about ‘fun time with Gamzee’ is correct.” Karkat glared at the door. “Helped you? Well, you’ve helped her, that’s for certain, but she hasn’t helped you. Not one bit. I mean, think about it. When has she ever done anything that’s aided _any_ of your goals?” John sniffed back a tear. “Exactly. So that’s two out of three down the load gaper. And as for not hurting you…” Karkat looked at Vriska. “What do you think, Vriska? Do you think she’s done grievous emotional harm?”

“And possibly more,” said Vriska. And for once, John heard the anxiety and worry in her voice. “That bitch shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near him again.”

“Then it’s settled,” said Karkat. “She’s not our family. She’s not our sister. And I, as your brother, will do everything in my power to protect you from that miserable writhing cunt.” He hugged his newly-found brother tightly, a few red tears spilling onto John’s shirt. “And I will make her pay for every injury she’s inflicted on you. I swear to whatever entities created our universe, _she will pay_.”

“…so if she’s not my family anymore…” John looked at Karkat. “But… there’s some things I have to tell you. We can’t leave yet. And we can’t overthrow her unless we want her to start killing us. We’re going to need some help getting rid of her.” Karkat nodded. “And she’s got Sollux and Kanaya.” A vein in Karkat’s forehead throbbed, and his fist clenched.

“That… that absolute pail-melting grub-fucking bitch,” he whispered. “I will murder her in her SLEEP.” John swallowed.

“I don’t think that’s possible… not without someone who can break into her room.”

“Which is pretty much impossible,” muttered Karkat. “…We’re going to contact Dave and Aradia. And then… we’ll come up with a plan. And then we’ll set our plan into motion.”


	4. Rainbow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Murder: n, The most heinous kind of criminal homicide; also, an instance of this. The unlawful killing of a human being with malice aforethought; often more explicitly _willful murder_. (OED)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "You were the only one who could stop it. But you didn't." In some cases, a good reason for trial. In no case at all a good reason for murder. This chapter will, most likely, debunk a _lot_ of speculation of my readers'. I apologize for that, but this was planned from the second chapter.

Jade stormed into the room, her right hand shaking slightly. “Hello, Kanaya. My assistant has been dismissed for a few days due to emotional distress. Something _your kind_ did to him.” She grabbed the scalpel from the table. “You know… your kind are very bad influences. You encouraged Rose to go after the horrorterrors, you encouraged John to set up the Tumor, you _killed_ John, you made Dave go away forever, you made John realize that he could never love me like I loved him…” The scalpel slid smoothly into Kanaya’s wrist, wrenching through veins that weren’t meant to heal, that wouldn’t bleed out the way a living troll’s veins would have. “So I’m afraid you won’t see him again.” She placed the scalpel aside. “Shame, really. We used to be such good friends.”

“We… can still be friends,” said Kanaya. Her eyes seemed to almost plead with Jade. “Please… Jade. We don’t need to be enemies…” Jade picked up a large wooden shard, almost like a crudely-hewn stake.

“We don’t need to be,” agreed Jade, “but we are.” She looked the long stake over lovingly. “This is holly. It’s said that driving this through a vampire’s heart will kill it. Let’s see if the same is true for a rainbow drinker.” Jade placed the holly stake carefully over Kanaya’s heart. Kanaya eyed it fearfully; she didn’t know earth vampire legends, or if their weaknesses were shared by rainbow drinkers. Jade drew her hammer and pounded the stake through her carapace, into her heart.

Kanaya let out a piercing cry of pain. She didn’t feel dead; on the contrary, it was probably the most alive she’d felt since giving up life to become a Rainbow Drinker. But the sensation was disturbing and she couldn’t help but feel more frightened as Jade pinned her to the table. “Jade… please…”

“Hmm. It didn’t work.” She frowned, picking up the next item on the tray. “Garlic. Said to be the bane of the vampire. Let’s see what it does to the rainbow drinker.” Kanaya froze. She knew what garlic did to rainbow drinkers. It wasn’t lethal, but… Powdered garlic flew everywhere, on her face, in her eyes, up her nose… More screams of pain left her body as the garlic wriggled its way into her carapace. As she writhed against the table she could feel it being absorbed, could feel it like fire running through her veins, a fire whose burning would never stop.

“Hmm. That’s odd. Garlic should be killing you, but it almost doesn’t work.” Jade pulled out another holly stake. “Still, may as well pin you down further before moving on to the banes of the rainbow drinker as so carefully outlined in your book collection.” Jade giggled. “How foolish of you to leave your weaknesses in plain view of someone who knows that, in the end, your race is a horrible blight upon paradox space and ought to have been wiped out ages ago.”

Kanaya felt the stakes align themselves as Jade exercised the same powers Kanaya had once had. “Wh-why… Jade? Why are you hurting me so much? If you wanted me dead, why this prolonged charade? Why this continued torture?”

Jade’s reply was the swing of a hammer, pinning her hand to the table. “I want to know things, Kanaya! All sorts of things!” She grinned at Jade as she moved onto the other hand. “Besides… you hurt me very badly. All trolls hurt me very badly. You destroyed my childhood, you blamed me for things I had no control over, you even turned my best friends crazy.”

Kanaya struggled against her wooden bonds, but she just wasn’t as strong anymore. Not with the pain from the garlic still coursing through her system. Jade hammered one foot into the table. “But Jade… I tried to dissuade Rose. I contacted you only after you had entered the Medium. I was…” Jade hammered in the last spike of holly wood.

“Yes,” she said. “You were helpful, in your own way. A Prospit dreamer, and one of the ones who underwent a drastic post-death transformation.” She pulled out a different scalpel, one with a sharp blade that glinted a little more than steel ought to. “And here’s the bridge in the gap. Silver. You know, in the original Dracula, he’s beheaded with a silver knife.”

The instrument slid gently across her face. The burns arising on her face were proof of the extreme cold silver inflected on rainbow drinker flesh. Her face was quickly coated in a combination of ice and frozen troll ichor. Jade grinned as she put the scalpel away. Kanaya simply stared in horror. If she was putting away the silver, that meant she had another bane… the one that would kill, but very slowly. And painfully. She gasped. “J-J-J-Jade… puh-puh-please duh-don’t-t-t-t-t….” Her fangs were chattering as Jade withdrew the item that had her so frightened.

Jade laughed. “You know, I never would have expected this of you. But… this stuff is excruciating for you, isn’t it?” She played with the onion in her hand. “It’s possibly the strangest weakness I’ve ever heard of… although it’s not too different from our vampires’ weakness to garlic. Even if it does make the death of the rainbow drinker take a lot longer than a simple silver knife to the head or obsidian spear in the head.” Jade grabbed her pulper as a few tears welled up in her eyes.

“Man, this stuff is strong,” she chuckled as she poured onion juice on certain non-key areas of her body. First the knees, then the hands, then down the arms. Kanaya felt it burn into her. The creeping cold of silver was nothing compared to the liquid nitrogen sensation of onion juice. She had no idea she could still feel this much pain, but there she was. It was as though her plan had been to inflict pain as much as possible.

It certainly explained certain things about her treatment. Such as the fact that the onion juice was now being dripped on open wounds. Wounds like the stake wounds, or the carvings on her face made by the silver knife. The burning from the garlic dust mixed with the ice of the onion juice, but instead of canceling each other out, it caused her to stiffen, her wounds screaming for release from this torture. “Please!”

“No, no, Kanaya. No release for you.” Jade grinned. “I’m sorry, old friend. Although I suppose it doesn’t matter, since Rose won’t be a lover of yours. You know she’s not interested in women.” Kanaya tried to arch her back, but couldn’t. The onion juice was freezing off her extremities. The pain she felt was horrible. She wanted it to stop. She needed it to stop. And then Jade brought out the final bane. Obsidian, crystallized in the heart of a volcano, carving off bits of flesh. “You’ll die eventually. I’ll make sure of it. But first, I want you to feel what your kind have done to me. All the pain you’ve caused, all the life you’ve ruined. Here, I’ll show you.” She forced Kanaya’s mouth open with a sort of strange expander attached to a funnel, pouring in another whole onion’s worth of juice. Her insides froze and shattered, unable to repair themselves due to a lack of fresh blood.

“Heeei… Heeeiggghh…” Tears welled up in Kanaya’s eyes. She tried pleading with her tormentor, tried to shout her name, tried to beg for mercy. Even as her vocal cords shattered, she pushed sound through her mouth. “Hhhhh… Hhhhh…” The sounds became sobs of pain, silent screams for mercy.

“Wider?” asked Jade. “Well… if you insist…” She turned a screw on the device. Kanaya’s jaw expanded further with a sickening crack, the sounds of bone snapping and muscle tearing and carapace cracking. Jade smiled, the expression on her face as eerie as Gamzee’s empty eyes had been. And still she could do nothing but feel her insides freeze and shatter, feel the onion juice flow through her windpipe, down into her lungs… she could feel her breath being denied. Air refused to flow into her lungs, because her lungs didn’t, technically, exist anymore. Crack. Shatter. Snap. Kanaya stared at Jade, who whistled as she was messing around with bottles. A tear ran down her face.

She couldn’t take it any more. Even if she’d wanted to stay alive, the destruction of her lungs and her inability to breathe meant… In her final thoughts, she cursed Jade. _May you be destroyed by your own misdeeds._

***

John looked up as Jade entered the room that now served as kitchen and mess hall. He slid back a few feet, backing off from her. Karkat had told him not to, but the urge to not even be in the same room with her was still incredibly strong. “Ah. John. Take another few days off. I’ll be… well, I’ll be looking at alternate experiments for a while. I may not even need sleep.” John shuddered. This wouldn’t be good. It wouldn’t be good at all. He had to see what she had done this time. He traced her tracks, arriving at the lab where she’d been keeping Aradia. He opened the door hesitantly.

The sight on the table was gruesome. John couldn’t help himself. Everything he’d been holding back in his time with Jade came spilling forth. He dropped to his hands and knees, sobbing as his vomit splattered on the cold tile. He could feel it pool around his hands, but at that point, he didn’t care. He had to purge what Jade had done from his system. Every last moment of torture and grief. He continued to heave long after his stomach’s meager contents had emptied themselves onto the tile floor, long after the stomach acid had risen up as well and coated his teeth. The acrid stench of the various liquids and the telltale markers of a corpse wafted upwards as John shakily got up and turned from the room, the door slamming shut behind him. There was no time. Karkat had to be warned.

When he returned to the mess hall, vomit staining his shirt and hands, he gave Karkat a pointed look. Karkat nodded and stood up, heading off to speak with Terezi. It was necessary. Then John left for the bathroom. True, it probably wasn’t entirely safe from Jade… but he had to wash up. The purge did nothing if you weren’t cleansed afterwards.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter wasn't easy to write. Especially since I genuinely like Kanaya and try to be nice to her in most of my other works (see, for instance, her having Vriska as a girlfriend in the 70s AU, or her not being killed by Eridan in Sixteen). Still... Sadist Jade demanded two things: Blood, and a shot at everyone in the cast who wasn't already dead. So... I'm sorry, Kanaya. D: So very sorry.


	5. Lies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Isolated: Placed or standing apart or alone; detached or separate from other things or persons; unconnected with anything else; solitary. (OED)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For future reference, Dave and Aradia are currently MIA setting up stable time loops for the defeat of Bec Noir. I'm not sure if it's been mentioned in prior chapters or not, so I'm mentioning it here and now, as an important thing for the plot.

The first thing she noticed upon waking was that her nose was plugged with what smelled like black cloth. Black was all she could smell. It was like back when she was first blinded. Back when Vriska had gotten her back for the incident with the white oracle. She heard footsteps, and turned to face them. After all, even though it wasn’t as developed as her smell, her sense of hearing was quite developed. The second thing she noticed was that she was tied to the chair, expert bindings holding her in place.

“Hi, Terezi!” said Jade. Terezi steeled herself. Kanaya had told her in her last dream what Jade had done, had told her that Jade wasn’t sleeping anymore. “I was hoping we could talk.”

“Is there a reason you’ve blinded me? Not that I don’t appreciate the ‘blind justice’ pun, but I’d rather talk to you unhindered.” Her voice sounded like she had a particularly bad head cold. “Although I suppose the bindings on my arms do that as well.” She twisted in her rope bindings. She was Justice, and Justice could not be bound by stupid knots. Her fingers fumbled; they felt numb as she tried to undo the knots.

“Hee hee… Terezi, you know as well as I do that the bindings on you are completely necessary! Especially since we both know what you’d do if I were in your position.” Jade continue pacing in front of her. “You’d sentence me to hang. Hang by the neck until poor little Jade’s face was blue, and oh wouldn’t John be angry that you’d killed his sister.” Terezi imagined a cruel grin on Jade’s face, something like what Vriska used to wear when she was feeling particularly vicious. Jade’s buck teeth ruined it.

“John doesn’t think of you as his sister anymore, Jade.” Jade’s laugh was unhinged and broken. “He thinks of you as someone he can leave behind. Someone who hurt him.”

“Oh, but I didn’t hurt him,” she cooed, and Terezi could feel Jade’s hand trace her jawline with a mockery of a lover’s caress. “You all did that. I just… showed him love and kindness.” Jade giggled as she withdrew the hand. “You’re the ones who broke him, who took him away from me.”

“Then tell me why he smelled of vomit six nights back.” Jade laughed. There was the sound of her picking something off a tray.

“Because he threw up,” said jade. “Really, it’s not at all uncommon when your diet’s as bad as his has been. Besides… John eats his meat medium-rare, but troll shouldn’t be eaten at all until it’s cooked through. Upsets the stomach otherwise.” Terezi frowned.

“So all these meals, we’ve been eating…”

“No, just the latest one,” said Jade. Terezi felt a sliver of pain as a knife sliced off her ear. Small blade. Probably not actually a knife at all, but a scalpel. That would be congruent with the size of the blade. Paper cloth was pressed to the side of her head. “Oh, such a mess these wounds make. I wish we were in one of my labs.” Terezi felt the scalpel pierce her right eye, felt the dead organ leak blinded fluid. “Oh well. Can’t be helped.” Something cold slid into her side. Terezi almost immediately recognized it as another scalpel. “You know… I’ve learned something about trolls.” The scalpel slid further, cutting her abdomen right in the bend at her waist. “Specifically, the boys have nipples but never use them, and the girls have ovaries… but the ovaries are only dormant, not vestigial.” A slice up the other side of her body. Jade carefully lifted up her shirt, leaving behind the cut flesh. “However… even if a troll used her ovaries… she’d still lay eggs, I bet. Nipples would still be useless.”

“Are you trying to get me to scream from pain? Because it won’t work.” Terezi felt Jade shove something in her mouth. An expander. It forced her mouth open as she grabbed something else from the tray.

“You know what? You’re probably right.” The device she’d picked sounded large and mechanical. “Then again, I’d also bet you haven’t had a tooth pulled with a pipe wrench.”

“A hhhu’k’?” She felt the strange earth device clamp down on her front two teeth. With a sudden wrench, the two teeth in the bottom front had abandoned ship. She winced as she began bleeding from the mouth. But she was strong. She was Terezi Pyrope. She could handle anything this bitch could dish — The clamp, or whatever it was, pulled out two more teeth. Then another pair, and another. Soon a round dozen teeth were missing from her mouth.

“I was really lucky to find the code for this,” said Jade. “So lucky. You have _no idea._ But… I dunno.” She collapsed and removed the expander. “Sure, pulling teeth feels good — it feels _real_ good. But… I think it’s time I use it for a more intended purpose, hm?” Terezi felt something collide with her knee. Pain coursed through her body. The wrench swung again and hit her left eye, which had up until that point merely been burnt out.

“Liar,” she said. “Everything you say is a lie, isn’t it?” She heard Jade laugh. “Sollux is alive, isn’t he?”

“For now. Although whether he’s still quite the same as the Sollux you knew is… debatable.” Terezi reached out with her power, trying to see the twists and turns of Jade’s mind. Perhaps she could get some insight into her tormentor, figure out a way to get out of this predicament.

The sensation was unlike any mind she’d ever glimpsed. Karkat had been straightforward, like staring down a hallway. Dave had been a confusing maze of twists and turns and dead ends trying to conceal a straightforward mind like Karkat’s (no wonder she had been attracted to him). John had been deceptively twisty and secretive for someone so naïve and kind, almost like Vriska’s mind, but sweeter. But they had all felt whole. Jade’s mind felt broken, and it burned at the cracks. Terezi flinched away at first before allowing her mind to slowly seek out the paths that would lead her to an idea of what to do without getting burned.

Something was shaving her left horn. She could feel the blade biting into the flesh as it slowly scooped out some of the horn, leaking some of her teal blood in a small rivulet. Then came the scraping of her kneecap. She grit her teeth and bore the pain as her patella was slowly and surgically exposed and removed. She knew the same would happen with the other kneecap. She focused all her energy on trying to figure out Jade’s mind.

Fires hotter than Sollux’s planet had been flashed in her head. She could smell the flames, green and white, almost as if Jade’s brain were the green sun. But that obviously wasn’t the case. Rose had seen the Green Sun. It had been described in great detail. A pure, green, warm glow that didn’t burn, except with enlightenment. The only harm inflicted by it was that its wielders inflicted. Such was not the case with Jade’s brain.

The fire seared through Jade’s brain, and Terezi caught a whiff of some of the images in it. John, tenderly kissing his sister (if she remembered right, a taboo). Karkat, disrobing the human eagerly. Vriska with a bullet in her heart as John smiled at the corpse, holding a smoking gun. Bec Noir on a leash, kept like a vicious pet. The images continued, a parade of the perverse, the taboo, and the vile. She pushed through, seeking the epicenter of the flames, teeth clenched to keep herself from crying out as a needle and thread sewed up her wounds. There had to be some reason. Some overarching thing that had happened. There was no other explanation. She couldn’t be this broken from her life. Not even Gamzee had been like this, when she’d finally glimpsed his sober mind.

Terezi felt the sewing needle finish its job. Desperately, she pressed onward, seeking the source of the damage, the place where it had all started. Was it there, where her grandfather lay dead? Was it there, where her dog had blown up the entire world? Was it even there, when Karkat had begun trolling her? She couldn’t tell. So many possible epicenters, and yet none of them felt _right_ for the epicenter. Perhaps if she dug deeper, searched further, she could find the path through the twisted, flame-cracked passageways of Jade’s mind. Perhaps, if she’d just ascended to Godhead…

The pain was almost gone. Terezi felt the numbing agent. Her hands were still tied. And then she felt an unusual sensation. The cloth that had tickled her nose was gone. There was a source of illumination, which allowed the colors to be smelled. She could see the teal stains on Jade’s shirt, could see her lick a bit of teal off a finger. “You taste good,” she said. “Now then, I’ve set it so the ropes fall off as soon as the door closes. But… at the same time, the lights will go out.” Jade laughed. “Oh, and I have your sylladex. So… I’m afraid you’ll have to occupy yourself.” Jade turned and began walking out. Terezi focused on her. She had to keep Jade from leaving until she found the epicenter.

The troll girl opened her mouth. “Hey! What are you doing?” she asked. Her dead red eyes betrayed her confusion. Jade just laughed again.

“This is an old human invention. It’s called a sensory deprivation chamber.” Jade had reached the door. “I think I’ll leave you in here for a while.” The vault door slammed shut. The light went out. Everything was black as pitch. The only sensations left were her clothes, now half-gone, and the decreasing pain. She reached up to her left horn. It wasn’t even bleeding anymore.

***

She had tried to keep track of time. After the pain had gone away, she had begun counting in paces. But she couldn’t keep up paces, and the room muffled any noise. The chamber was as warm as she was, so she had only the texture to go on — and through a troll carapace, that was difficult to go by. She had been through eight thousand nine hundred forty-six paces when Jade returned, briefly, to strip her of the rest of her clothing. Jade had flooded the room with knockout gas before entering, a clever trick that had almost killed Terezi. As she continued walking, she began talking to herself to try and stay sane.

By the first sleep, she was a gibbering, hallucinating wreck. “Karkles, no, I’m not letting you touch me there with your bone bulge. Seriously, do you have any idea how disgusting that is? Would be?” She grinned at the air. “Of course I love him, Gamzee. I’m only walking around like this because my clothes vanished. No, Kanaya, I don’t blame you. It wasn’t you who suggested we play ‘Hide the snake in the cave’…”

She turned as the door opened. “Eridan?”

“Nope!” came a dementedly cheery voice. Terezi turned. That voice inspired fear for some reason. It wasn’t any troll, that much she knew. She sniffed; whatever it was, it was pink. Pink and black-haired and wearing… glasses. “Guess again.”

“…Mindfang?” The cheery voice laughed again. Something triggered in the back of Terezi’s memory. A name… “…Jade.”

“Good, you remember me!” Jade grinned at her. “I’m glad to see it. Especially since I left you in here for so long… I’m not sure how many hours it’s been.” Terezi shuddered. Karkat would be worried. She’d tell him what happened as soon as she… Jade shoved her to the floor. “Now now, Terezi. I hope you weren’t planning on running! Not when I was just delivering you some food. I imagine you’re starving.”

“Food? Why should I eat anything you…” Her stomach grumbled. “Anything you made?”

“Because it’s that or continue starving… and it’s already been two days. Trolls can’t survive too long without food. And I’m being merciful to you! Sollux once went seven days without food. Gamzee took a nine day hiatus from eating while his achilles tendon was still causing him too much pain. I think John’s been eating less too… tsk tsk, so unhealthy for him. And his sperm count.” Terezi took a step backwards. “Here. Eat. Otherwise Karkles… well… hee hee hee…”

“What are you doing to him?” asked Terezi. A note of horror crept into her voice.

“Nothing yet. Eat, and I probably won’t do anything to him. Don’t eat… and I definitely will.” She set a plate of food on the floor. “Sweet dreams, Terezi. Sensory deprivation is go again…” The door slammed closed. The black was back. The only thing she could sense… was the food. She dove onto the plate and began frantically eating, hoping that a clean plate would save Karkat from Sollux’s fate.

***

Karkat looked at John. “She should have been back by now. It wasn’t a difficult assignment. Send Dave a message explaining what Jade’s doing to us, asking what to do.”

“She should’ve been able to get the most recent Dave, too,” he added, opening a package of rice and pouring it into the pot of boiling water. “You don’t think that…”

“Don’t say it,” said Karkat. “If that’s true, I might become sick to my stomach.” He sighed. “I’ll get Rose to write a message for him. I just hope it’ll work.”

“I hope so too.” John looked at the covered pot full of rice. “I hope so too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Ten little Soldier boys went out to dine; one choked himself and then there were nine.  
>  Nine little Soldier boys sat up very late; one overslept himself and then there were eight.  
> Eight little Soldier boys traveling in Devon; one said he'd stay there and then there were seven.  
> Seven little Soldier boys chopping up sticks; one chopped himself in half and then there were six.  
> Six little Soldier boys playing with a hive; a bumblebee stung one and then there were five.  
> Five little Soldier boys going in for law; one got into Chancery and then there were four.  
> Four little Soldier boys going out to sea; a red herring swallowed one and then there were three.  
> Three little Soldier boys walking in the zoo; a big bear hugged one and then there were two.  
> Two little Soldier boys sitting in the sun; one got frizzled up and then there was one.  
> One little Soldier boy left all alone; he went out and hanged himself and then there were none._


	6. Candy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Slavery: n, The condition or fact of being entirely subject to, or under the domination of, some power or influence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was probably the secondmost uncomfortable chapter to write, after chapter three. Read onward if you dare.

Karkat hadn’t seen Jade or Terezi for ten days. Vriska’s luck wasn’t getting her anywhere with the search except finding Sollux — and barely evading Jade coming out of the room. After what she’d done to John, she didn’t want to be alone with Jade, and Karkat couldn’t blame her. Given how Jade was, she’d probably kill the god girl. Even though she probably technically couldn’t.

Jade’s surprise arrival in his room, therefore, had been an extreme shock. Moreso when he noticed what she was holding. She was holding what appeared to be a set of shackles. “OK, what the fuck.” The sickle was in his hand before she’d even opened her mouth. “Where the fuck is Terezi.”

“Aww… Karkles has a crush!” Karkat growled. “Don’t worry about the blind girl. She’s reasonably safe. For now. I make sure to clean up after her so that there aren’t any sensations for her. I have a feeling if I didn’t she’d go crazy.” Karkat took a step towards her.

“You crazy bitch. What the hell have you done to her?” Jade smiled.

“Like I said. She’s safe for now. But if you keep this up… well… I might just have to go and make sure she isn’t.” For a moment, Karkat was paralyzed. That was all the moment Jade needed, apparently, to throw something at him, knocking the sickle out of his hand. “Don’t worry, Karkles. I have a way for you to keep her safe.”

“…” Karkat shuddered. Terezi didn’t have a dreamself anymore. If he wanted her to be safe, he’d have to protect her himself. “What’s the way?” Jade’s grin was some horrible mocking expression of joy.

“So glad you asked!” She walked forward with the shackles. “The first step is to let me put these on you.” Karkat shuddered. “I’ll need your wrists and your ankles for this one, Candyblood.” His incredulous expression must have betrayed his hesitancy, because she said “Now Karkles! You have a choice, you know! You do this itty bitty thing for me, or dear sweet Blind Spot isn’t safe anymore!”

Karkat stepped forward. “This is where I’d say that this is low,” he said, holding out his arms, “but for you? This is an improvement.” The heavy iron shackles were soon tight around his wrists and ankles. “So how long do I have to wear these?”

“Until I let you take them off,” said Jade, grinning. “Now then. Empty your sylladex and strife specibus.” Karkat’s look said it all; he thought she thought he was mental. “Do it. Otherwise I’ll let Pyrope be tanglebuddies with the Horrorterrors. And I don’t mean by letting her die.” Karkat emptied everything out of his sylladex and specibus, removing even the simple sickle he’d started out with. Jade collected it all, and then snatched away his fetch modus and his specibus. “You won’t be needing these.”

“OK, what the fuck gives you any right at all to — “ Her hand moved faster than he thought possible. Before he knew what was coming, she had slapped his face.

“You will not speak until spoken to.” Jade looked him over. “Good, good, looks like a firm, strong, _healthy_ specimen.” She had begun to affect a strange, drawling accent. Karkat would have found it erotic if it weren’t looking over him like a piece of furniture. She shoved open his lips and gave his teeth a once-over. “Good age, too. Yes, I think this will do nicely.” Karkat glared at her. “Now all we need is a name… how about Tom? Yes… yes, Tom sounds good. It sounds _very_ good.” He tried to back out as she took a cast-iron collar from her sylladex, but the stupid shackles meant she was faster than him, and before he could object she had him collared and chained. “Well, I do declare. The payment’s been made in advance.” She grinned, grabbing the chain and beginning to walk from the room. “Come, Tom.”

Under his breath, Karkat muttered, “Not on your fucking life, you bitch.” Jade yanked the chain, her voice unbearably cheerful.

“Tom, _come_!” Karkat remained stubbornly still. “My, my. Looks like we have a lesson needs to be taught.” She somehow fastened the chain in place to a cabinet, and from a strife specibus she pulled out a long, heavy whip. “I think thirty lashes ought just about do it.” She walked around behind him. His stupid fucking leg irons meant that he wasn’t going to be able to move fast enough to avoid her —

“Ow!” The whip scored a line up the entire length of his back. “What the fuck!”

“A good slave obeys its master’s orders, Tom.” Wha-crack! The whip fell again, tearing a line a good foot long through Karkat’s bare carapace, spilling the candy-red blood underneath. “A lesson you’ll have to learn.” A third crack of the whip. “Otherwise I don’t think your mate’ll live to rut with anything.” A fourth crack. He could feel his blood burning on his back. “Strange to see somethin’ so inhuman have human blood.” The fifth crack of the whip scored the base of his neck.

“Jade… what…” A crack of the whip lashed the space between two of his ribs.

“My name is Mistress, Tom.” The seventh and eighth cracks fell with grunts of pain — Karkat could hold out, but this was ridiculous. “Who am I, Tom?” A ninth whiplash. Karkat’s shirt was a bloody tatter on the back. “I said who am I? A slave ought be prompt in answerin’!” The tenth whip-crack scratched one of his horns as well as scraping another line on his back.

“Y-you… are the Mistress,” said Karkat. The eleventh whip-crack came, and Karkat’s grunt of pain went almost unnoticed.

“Louder,” she said, and the whip came down a twelfth time.

“Y-you’re the Mistress!” Thirteen.

“No contractions now! Who am I, slave?” Fourteen.

“M-mistress… agh… you are the… ngh… m-mistress… YEOW!” Eighteen. Nineteen. Twenty. Karkat felt the new wounds opening, felt the blood pouring down his back and running through the cracks already made in his carapace.

“And you are?” Twenty-one.

“Kark—AUGHFUCK!” Knight of Blood or not, this was still a ludicrous amount of blood loss. He knew he’d survive it, but he would be weakened for days. “Kark — OHGOD!” There was more of a bite in that last swing, and Jade spoke again, furiously lashing the whip as she did so.

“Your! Name! Is! Tom!” The shirt was finally shocked off him. “Now. What. Is your name.” Her voice was quiet.

“Karkat… Vantas.” Another lash. That made thirty. And then another.

“Thirty more lashes,” said Jade, “and another ten every time you get your name wrong. Now what’s your fucking name.”

Karkat wasn’t sure how many lashes he could handle, but he wasn’t going to give up. “Karkat.” The lash stung as it whipped his raw back further. “Vantas.” The flesh was being flayed. “Karkat.” He shuddered as she continued to whip him. “Vantas.” The whip’s rise and fall coincided with his continued utterance of his name. Before too long, his carapace was so broken it might as well not have been there, and the raw muscle was being torn by the whip. But still he kept saying his name. By his calculations, he was up to forty-five out of a staggering two hundred ten lashes. “Vantas.” Forty-six out of two hundred twenty now.

Although he didn’t know it at the time, he would reach eighty lashes before he passed out from exhaustion and blood loss.

***

When he woke up, his back was covered in lash-marks. The wounds had scabbed, and he began counting. “Eighty out of five hundred sixty lashes delivered, Tom. You are one stubborn, ugly cuss.” Jade grinned at him. He turned his head and saw the candy-red stains on the floor. “But I was right in my assessment! Hale and strong. Probably virile too, but I won’t check that. Leastwise not afore you’ve gotten your next four hundred eighty.” She pulled a knife, an honest-to-god bowie knife, from her sylladex. Or perhaps her strife specibus. He wasn’t sure anymore.

“You know, Tom, you seem almost human. Hell. I think I’ll do you the honors of making you as human as I can.” The knife sliced through his left horn without much resistance, and Karkat kept his response to the intense pain to a grunt. “And the other one,” The knife sliced the other horn clean off, as well as removing bits of scalp and connected skull. “Then dock the ears…” The knife wasn’t meant for delicate work. As it sliced through his ears, he could feel it cutting into the bone behind. “And then come the hard parts.”

She looked at him, sighing. “I’m afraid there’s nothing I can do for your eyes. So we’ll have to work extra-hard on the rest of you.” Jade stripped him of everything but the irons. “Now… Let’s bleach, hm? Good way to get rid of pigment, bleaching. Kinda toxic, though. Might want to wait until the bloodflow stops.” Jade drew a file from her sylladex. As she did, her voice returned to normal. “Now, no biting, or we’ll bleach anyway and if you die…” Jade shrugged. “Well, Pyrope’s lived a fulfilling life. Alone in a tree for thirteen years, orphaned, raised by animals, falling in love with the first poor sap to give her anything…” The file came down on Karkat’s teeth, and as she scraped the teeth painfully, he grimaced. This was a metal file. Was she really using this to…

Karkat began sweating. In the movies, and probably in real life, SM/torture blackrom scenes always had a safe word. But Jade had whipped him into unconsciousness and then waited for him to come out of it before ladling on more torture. That realization terrified him almost as much as the prolonged damage to his teeth hurt him. He had proud Alternian fangs. He was no herbivore. And no human bitch was going to make him into… into… Karkat winced. If he didn’t play along (although he was less sure this was play anymore) then Terezi would be hurt. Possibly killed. He knew Jade had it in her. John’s vomit-stained shirt told him that much.

“OK! Teeth done! Now then… I think the ears are scabbed over well enough!” The accent had returned. Jade led him over to a disconnected ablution trap. “Hmm. You know, I suppose I could claim that you’re suffering from argyria… but you’re my slave, and slaves don’t eat Mistress’s silver jewelry.” Into the tub went several gallons of industrial-strength bleach, emptied from their containers and mixed with something Jade called “soap”. Karkat was dubious of this claim. Still, she motioned for him to get in.

The sensation burned. The bleach was whitening his carapace almost like it was a bad dye, stripping him of pigment and causing him extreme pain, while the “soap” (which Karkat now recognized as lye) burned away at his skin, giving him a chemical burn that would last forever. “AAAARGH!” Karkat looked at her. “MISTRESS!” She pulled him out, heavy gloves on her hands. “Mistress…” She began dousing him in vinegar and soda. “Mistress… burns…”

“Shh… shh… I know it does,” she said. “But that’s the way it has to be. That’s the only way to make you presentable.” Eventually the bases were neutralized, and Karkat was placed back in the irons. They were, by now, his only clothing. “And there! I seem to have done a number on little Tom, though. I doubt he’ll work again in the same way.” Jade smiled, and whispered in his ear, “If you will remain my slave, Terezi will remain safe. Well? Do we have a deal?” Karkat shuddered. It was for the good of the team, he reminded himself. The good of the team, and their best hope of getting out alive.

“Y-yes, Mistress,” he choked. The smell of vinegar and urine wafted through the room.

“Good. Now, Tom, go to the galley and tell Cooky that I’d like one steak, well done, and be quick or you’ll get the lash more than you already have comin’.” Karkat gasped. He’d be able to talk to John. He’d be able to tell him that the plan needed to be accelerated.

***

John wasn’t sure who the shackled, naked, white person who came in was, but the paleness of his complexion was blinding and his eyes were suspiciously yellow. “Hey, John.” John gasped at the voice. “John, you’re going to have to ask Rose to find Terezi. Jade’s making me serve her or something, she keeps tossing the word ‘slave’ around.” He shuddered. “Make sure Rose finds Terezi and gets her the fuck out of where she is. Until then I’ll have to be Jade’s shitty servant.”

John looked into his pot. “Karkat… she hasn’t… has she?”

“Not yet. Believe you me, though. When this is over? When this is over she’s going to be a fine paste.” Karkat glared at the pot. “In the meantime, Jade wants a steak. She says well done. I say… add a little cyanide.” John shuddered. Karkat’s eyebrows narrowed. Surely John wasn’t going to refuse, was he?

“I… I can’t hurt my sister like that, Karkat.” John began cooking a steak. “If it were laxatives, or some prank, I could, but…”

“She’s not our sister,” growled Karkat through clenched teeth. “She raped you, she’s torturing me, she’s taking things out on my best fucking friends…” Karkat glared at him. “Look. I’ll play along with your little game. But the _moment_ Megido and Strider return, we switch to my plan.” He watched John flip the steak over. “And my plan is this: Harley. Dies.” John’s attention was firmly on the steak. “Get Rose. Tell her to rescue the fuck out of Terezi. And then we’ll go from there.” Karkat took the well-done steak in his bare hands. The numbness was, for once, in his favor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _All it takes for evil to succeed is for good men to do nothing._


	7. Seer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Distraction: n, The drawing away of the mind or thoughts from one point or course to another; diversion of the mind or attention. (OED)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow. Can't believe I forgot this. Anyway, this is the part where the rescues begin. Thankfully. It's only taken what, six chapters of people disappearing? So yeah. Still not sure why I didn't note it up.

The white oracle had been kind enough to provide a map to the sensory deprivation chamber Jade had built, as well as a way to bypass her security measures. Rose opened the door. It seemed she was fated to do this. Someone sat in the middle of the room. Someone gray-carapaced and naked. She seemed to be trying to type something in midair without a computer. “Silly Tavros,” she muttered. “They’re not just for girls! Eridan plays FLARP too…” Rose approached her. “Who’s there? You… pink and gold? You’re not the weird laughy one who brings the food, are you?”

“Terezi… It’s me. Rose.” The blind girl turned to look at her, nostrils flaring. “Remember?” The nostrils flared again.

“R… Rose…” Terezi looked lost in thought. “I… I remember, Kanaya talked about a flower called a rose, once… it was one of her weird rainbow drinker romance flowers… Does that make you a… rainbow drinker?” Rose shook her head. “Hmm… You’re strange, Pink Gold Rose. Terezi reached out and rubbed her scalp. “No horns. I’m so sorry. Did something happen?” Rose shook her head. “Where are we going?”

“Terezi… who’s your best friend?”

“Oh, that’s easy!” Terezi grinned. “Karkat and Vriska! Karkat’s a grumpy sourpuss but he’s OK enough, and Vriska’s kinda crazy but she’s also _super cool_. We’ve been FLARPing together for half a sweep now! That’s actually how I met her, through FLARP.” She looked down. “D’you like my symbol? I picked it ‘speciallly because it’s a beautiful teal symbol. The perfect symbol for a future legislacerator, even! It means balance.” Rose nodded.

“Terezi, how old are you?”

“Gonna be four sweeps old next perigee. I’m super excited because Karkat said he’d come up to my hive! I may need glasses, though. Everything’s all blurry. I don’t remember it bein’ this blurry…” Rose plugged her nose. “Ah! Rose! Where are you? Why did it go dark?!”

“Terezi… you went blind. After Vriska killed Aradia.”

“Vriska… killed Aradia?” Terezi looked incredulously at Rose. “What the hell are you talking about? Aradia’s still alive! She visited me in my dream last night. She was a fairy queen.”

“Terezi, you’re six sweeps old. You’ve been blind, from what you’ve told me, for a sweep and a half by now.”

“…But… I…” Terezi looked at rose with pleading eyes, almost as if to say “No, please don’t do this.”

Rose pressed forward. “Vriska crippled Tavros, and eventually killed him. You played a game called Sgrub where you eventually created a universe.” Terezi collapsed to the floor.

“I… I what?” Rose picked her up and held her.

“You were the Seer of Mind. You had — and still have — the power to delve into others’ minds. Here, attempt mine.” Terezi looked at Rose plaintively, her dead eyes still suggesting some emotion. “I know you can.” Terezi reached out slowly with her mind. The benefits of being a Seer, Rose knew, extended to a variety of powers, but the best of it all was the ability to instinctively pierce deception.

Provided you weren’t crazy. “I can’t be. Vriska’s the one with mind powers, not me.”

“Please. Just try. Reach out with your mind.” Rose felt the other girl probing her mind. Rose concentrated on the mental image of Karkat. Hopefully that would help.

“…Why are you thinking about Karkles? He’s mine! Mine mine mine!” Well, that was a step forward, even if she was still thinking of herself as a young girl. “But… wait… I remember… He wanted to talk to me… he had a plan…” She looked at Rose. “…A message for… for Dave. Someone named Dave.” Rose could see the her straining to remember, to break through the madness that held her. “I… I can see it. I… was supposed to… message… for Dave…” Terezi shook slightly. “How long… in there…”

“Sixteen days, at least,” said Rose. “Things are different now. We’ll have to hide you. John’s room or the kitchen are the safest places. Jade never goes there.” Terezi nodded. “I’ll bring you to the kitchen. John or Vriska can help you from there.”

***

“Rose? Why, Rose, what a pleasant surprise!” Karkat’s front and face were a mass of lash scars. He was passed out again, bleeding from eighty new cuts. “Tsk tsk tsk. Tom still won’t accept his new name.” Jade smiled at Rose. “What do you think? He looks almost human, doesn’t he?”

“Yes. In some demented way, I guess he does.” Rose arched an eyebrow. “You know, I have some friends who would be interested in seeing what you’ve become.” The grimdark was hers to control. Rose could call forth the Horrorterrors’ influence if she felt she needed to. It was almost on par with god-tier. There was no way Jade could…

“Friends?” Jade grinned. “I know all about your friends. They’re Feferi’s friends, too. And Jack wants to hurt them… but he wants us dead more.” Jade laughed. “But it’s OK. I know your friends want to talk.” Jade idly drew her whip and lashed Karkat again. “So let’s me and them… talk.”

Rose snarled. She raised her right hand. Grimdark forces crowded into it. That grimdarkness flooded her body, grabbing her and shaking her body like a rag doll. She finally stood, holding her twin wands in her hands, the yarn between them black as night. “Bl’groth mb hothaht, Jgdgd.” Jade laughed. “Mb hothaht!”

“So funny,” said Jade, her whip coiling around one of the Thorns of Oglogoth. “You think you can kill me. You think your black magic can zap a hole right in little old me.” The wand cracked against Karkat’s skull, its power fizzling in a decidedly un-explosive fashion. Rose clenched her fist tight. Rose raised the wand and fired off a beam of black power, a beam that Jade somehow dodged, despite the close range and the wand aimed at her midriff. “Powerless. You refuse to think of yourself as such, but you are.” The whip was swapped out for a different one, one that had no seeming physical difference… until it sliced into Rose’s right arm. “Like it?” Rose dropped the thorn in surprise from the whip seemingly having a bladed edge. “The lash is made of scalpel.” Another slash, this one cutting through Rose’s midriff. “Rose, Rose, Rose. Why are you fighting me?”

“Nglb’bf.” Rose gritted her teeth. “Nglb’bf kzok Tglrb’gzgr.” Jade laughed. “NGLB’BF!”

“I guess that means anger.” She laughed as Rose ran at her, tossing the whip aside. “Anger for what I did with Tom Candyblood?” Rose stopped suddenly mid-run, eyes wide. “Why, Rose. I do believe I see something in your stomach. Let me get that for you.”

Rose looked down. The knife in her abdomen expanded as Jade pressed a button on the hilt. Her stomach was rent in twain by the knife’s sharp edges, and as Jade pulled it out, she could feel the wound widen. Another knife quickly found its way to her solar plexus, a knife long enough to pierce her all the way through. Rose wondered how Jade could get a knife that long. She would have had to alchemize a… sword…

She could hold out no longer. Rose collapsed from the massive physical trauma. The last thing she heard before blackout was “Aww. But I wanted to play some more.”

***

Rose awoke hours later. At least, she figured that was how long had passed. She looked at her still-bleeding wounds. Karkat was kneeling next to her. “…ngh… so I’m a… glorified pincushion?”

“And she’s having me keep you alive. It hurts, doesn’t it, Rose? I… never really got the hang of Blood Healing. Sorry I can’t do anything more.” Karkat ran a finger under her abdominal wound. “I’ve sewed up your stomach as best I can. This other wound… well, it’s taken all my power for now to keep it from bleeding you out.” Karkat sat, hands in his lap, and sighed. “Did you at least get the message for Dave written?”

“Yeah. And I have a surprise. One that Jade won’t mention, if what you’ve said to John is true.” Rose smirked. “Terezi’s in the kitchen. She’ll be in John’s room by tonight. And Jade can’t exactly kill you while Terezi’s at large, or Terezi will find and kill her. And with Jade in that uncertain spot…”

“She could still kill you,” reminded Karkat. “John’s in human love with Vriska, not you.” Rose shrugged.

“John’s suggested that I might have had a chance with him, in the past. And honestly? I don’t mind sharing him with Vriska, if it comes down to that.”

“You sure you weren’t hatched a troll?” asked Karkat. Rose laughed.

The door slammed open. Jade glared at her newest acquisition. “Rose… we need to talk. Tom… keep her alive. Use any means necessary.” Jade grabbed a scalpel and several metal clips. “I’m going to make you tell me what you’ve done, Lalonde. We’re humans. We’re supposed to stick together, rise above those sub-humans.” Rose could feel the scalpel cutting into her skin, could feel Jade peel the flesh back to expose muscle, bone, and organs. “But I guess you don’t care about your species, Rose. You don’t care about your own _family_ compared to some gray-skinned menace from another universe.”

Rose spat at Jade as the other girl slowly pored over her victim. The spit hit her nose, and Jade’s only response was to wipe it off and shake it into Rose’s body with her hand. Rose shouted. The pain was almost unbearable, she was trying her hardest to shut it out, but… Jade began messing around. “Hmm. Appendix still hasn’t been removed? Well, that’s vestigial. I can take it out, no repercussions.” Jade deftly sliced out the organ. Rose screamed from the pain. It hurt, but the idea of Jade finding where Terezi was hurt more. “You want to tell me what happened with my pet?”

“B…blow me…” Jade arched an eyebrow before grinning devilishly.

“Hmm. A bit feisty still.” Jade began rooting around through her intestines. “Here we go. Kidneys. Plural.” She cut one loose from its moorings, and Rose let out a high-pitched whine of pain. “But you only need one. Just like you don’t, strictly speaking, need your spleen.” That organ was severed as well, and Rose grit her teeth and tried hard to suppress the cry caught in her throat. “So. You’ve had an appendectomy, a kidney removed, and your spleen has gone on to greener pastures. Will you tell me what you did with experiment four A?”

“Ffffffuck… you.” Rose could tell Karkat was using his powers to keep her from dying from the exposure of her organs to air, as well as the internal bleeding Jade was causing. Jade tsked and placed the scalpel aside.

“My, how uncooperative. I suppose we’ll have to go to more drastic measures, since you don’t care about redundant organs.” Jade drew a needle and thread from her sylladex. “Now then, Rose. I think I’ll start by sewing an eye shut. Your left eye, as a matter of fact. The one with the magic vision.” Rose didn’t dare struggle as Jade approached her with the needle. One simple move, and she would die. Now, that would be a good thing if she weren’t still needed according to Karkat’s plan. His horribly messed up plan that should have been given more forethought. Rose whimpered as Jade sewed her eye shut. At least it wouldn’t be as cruel an injury as she could be given. “Now will you explain?”

“A-huh… a-huh… n-no…” Rose didn’t mean for those dry sobs to happen. But then again, she had to acknowledge the pain. Her strength lay in her mental resilience. She could bear physical pain. She had to.

“Well, poo. There’s a few things I don’t want to cut out, seeing as you’re still a human girl. John might have use for you.” She moved to get rid of the metal clamps when an idea dawned on her face. “…You know, Rose… I’m not sure I’m all that ready to forgive you maturing faster than me.” The scalpel was back in her fingers. “But for an answer, I’ll let you keep them. Now where. Is. Four. A.”

“G-huh… G-huh… Go to…hell…” Rose knew what the scalpel was doing the instant it hit her flesh. She gritted her teeth. Involuntary breast reduction surgery was the least of her worries right now. Pain could be suffered to keep others safe.

As soon as Jade sewed her back up, Rose threw up. It wasn’t the wisest move; her stomach was still tender from the puncturing it had received earlier that day, and the acidity of her vomit was only exacerbating the problem. Jade looked at Karkat. “Keep the flesh doll alive, Tom. She’s going to be our new friend.” Rose glared at her as best she could. “I think I’ll call you… Bunny.” Rose didn’t make a move. So long as she stayed in position, she could keep up the façade. And then, once Jade left… Jade turned and went out the door. Rose collapsed, weeping and screaming from the pain. Karkat placed a hand on her shoulder.

“I’m sorry, Rose. We have to trust our hope to Dave now.”

***

Vriska had whisked Terezi away almost immediately after entering the kitchen. “This isn’t part of a one-upmanship plot, is it?” Vriska sighed. “Remember our truce, Mindfang.”

“Ugh. I swear on Dualscar’s obsessive clinginess that it’s not a part of a one-upmanship plot. Besides, this is something I wouldn’t want to try to one-up someone in.” Vriska growled. “Anyway. You need to recover. And if what Rose says is right, that means being around us. Me and John and Rose. The last three free people. Well, three of the last four now, counting you.” Vriska sighed. “I just hope Rose isn’t doing something stupid.”

“She is,” said John, walking in the door and shutting it quietly. “Karkat just came down for Jade’s night order. Rose went to fight Jade. But… She lost.” John looked at the floor. “Vriska… I’m going to free them. I’m going to get them out of that hellish nightmare. Please… give me some of your luck.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _They think our heads are in their hands  
>  But violent use brings violent plans  
> No more can they keep us in  
> Listen, dammit, we will win  
> They see it right, they see it well  
> But they think this saves us from our hell  
> _


	8. Jealousy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Immortal: adj, Not mortal; not liable or subject to death; deathless, undying; living for ever. (OED)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Even though you led him to your friends, even though you tried to kill them... you never really wanted them to die. There was no part of you that wanted them to die.

I used to be the luckiest person ever. I could waltz through traps and they’d not only refuse to go off, they’d outright implode. I could make the ground fall out from under my opponent. I was so lucky I didn’t even need to beg my dice for good results; they’d give me exactly what I wanted, when I wanted it.

Then John asked me for some luck. He said he wanted a little, but I knew John. What he wanted and what he needed were usually two wildly different things. And right now? Right now, John needed a lot of luck. Almost all of it. If he was going to do what he said, he’d need more luck than… well, than I’d be able to part with safely. I’d be dipping back into unluckiness. But I had to. John was the one who stood the best chance of rescuing everyone. John was the hero.

I was just a pretender to the throne.

***

The door to John’s room was upgraded by Aradia when she recently dropped by. It was some time after Terezi disappeared for those weeks. She’s still not better, but given enough time I think she’ll make as full a recovery as she can. It’s improvement.

John was going to bring them back, one by one. It was easier to keep a handle on your luck with small groups, I’d told him. Pairs were ideal. John had taken that to heart, thankfully. He’s not usually one to look out for his own self-interest. He wants to make sure others are doing all right. It’s his most endearing quality, as well as the one that makes me want to throttle him nine times out of ten.

I had told him I’d head to the galley and prepare some food. He knew I was a horrible cook, and this was mostly an excuse to leave the safety of that concrete cage he’d trapped me in… but he still let me go. Poor, dumb John. I wish I could say I’d manipulated you. But… I think you genuinely wanted me to get out and have some freedom. It was so frustrating, being cooped up in that little room _all the goddamn day_ and _all the goddamn night_. And I was sick of hiding now. I was going to find Jade and kill her. End her puny little life.

I got maybe seven feet from her before she’d filled me so full of bullets I could be used as Eridan’s boat’s anchor, if he still had a boat and he weren’t so dead. You never really think about the immortality bit of godhood until it’s tested. I could feel my body shifting the bullets around, lubricating them in blue blood as they pushed through my body. I was still alive, somehow. I think it’s because I’d gone back to unluckiness.

If I were lucky, I wouldn’t have survived. Or maybe I would’ve been able to dodge.

The Fluorite Octet fell from my hand as I collapsed in an expanding pool of blood. I watched it roll out something. Perhaps I’d get lucky. Wound transference. Flesh-eating worms. All 8s again. Of course, it didn’t happen. They were some random assortment of numbers. Some of them doubled up, nothing really damaging. The worst part was, I’d half expected it. Expected Jade to try and kill me, expected the Octet to be useless. My luck didn’t matter, in the end. It was all John.

***

I woke up strapped to an operating table, forceps digging into me, searching for bullets. They weren’t tweezers. Tweezers didn’t go rooting through open flesh as the hands of Jade Harley, who was leaning over my abdomen with piqued curiosity. “You know… You’re a goddess, Vriska. That means so much. You’ve got so much power. I almost wonder if you haven’t grown complacent. I mean, you didn’t even try to steal my luck!” Jade plucked a spent bullet from my intestines. “Shredded you up pretty good with the gun, though.”

“Can’t steal luck from you,” I said. It was hard to speak; my diaphragm and lungs had both been damaged, and their repairs were being slowed by Jade’s search for the bullets. Still, I managed to force out another sentence. “Can’t steal what isn’t there.” Jade laughed.

“Oh, come on! I had to have some luck. I got Sollux, didn’t I? And I captured Gamzee. Not really things a person could do without a little luck.” I smiled grimly at her. She was saving the bullets in my heart for last.

“Could be bad luck.” I gasped in pain as she pulled on something that was most definitely _not_ a bullet.

“Interesting.” She continued to root around in my stomach. “You know, it almost seems like you’ve got an even more complex digestive system than us. You have no idea how lonely it gets. I only have Tom and Bunny to talk to, and they don’t like me. I mean, I still talk to them, but Tom doesn’t respond to his name, and Bunny just sits there and stares.” My teeth were gritted as Jade continued to play with my insides. Her squeal of joy at my liver was almost demented. “Oh, Vriska! Your liver! It’s blue!” Her eyes focused on mine, and I could feel the loathing coming off her in waves. “Just like your blood. And the rest of your insides.” I would eventually be saved, I told myself. Eventually, all would be well. I would be rescued from the demoness.

***

It was six hours, I reckon, before John got them all together. My torture had lasted at least that long. His luck had been phenomenal, and he’d saved almost everyone. Gamzee… well, John had wanted to save him, but I had no idea if he’d succeeded or not. I hoped he had; sure, Gamzee was terrifying now, but he was still my friend.

All that was left was me. And I was still being tended to by Jade. I wasn’t a villain anymore. But I wasn’t dying, either. It was as if my destiny had refused to allow me dignity. Wasn’t I good enough to be a martyr? Jade had fished out the bullets, as well as removing half my gastrointestinal track and a large portion of my internal anatomy. I could feel the vestigial organs growing back. I could feel the lungs slowly pushing against everything else, could feel the slow grows of every internal organ. I wished John would come soon. It would be a blessing.

Finally Jade turned from me. She pulled off her bloodstained gloves. “Well, time to check on experiment one A!” Jade grinned as she rushed out of the room. I, meanwhile, was trying to scream out the pain of regrowing my lungs. Usually, that doesn’t happen…. but then again, usually I hadn’t had my lungs half torn apart while they were still being put back together, or had my chest clamped tight in a vise. Still, I was able to grit my teeth and just bear it.

A sudden pain shot through my left leg. I wasn’t sure what the electrical signal was, but I had a feeling that my escape was going to be much harder to effect. Next thing I knew, two other joints had joined the right knee in spasming, and the muscles around those joints had begun to twitch erratically, contracting as current passed through them. Protip: current fucking hurts. And that combined with the pain of regrowing organs, well… Someone unobservant would probably see the jerking caused by the electric jolts and assume it was a seizure. And then I’d get the restraints tightened on me. I just hoped I would have some good luck for once.

It was about then that John came in. I’m fairly certain I screamed the word “hurts”, and a few yelps of pain as I twitched… and by some stroke of luck, he understood and loosened the restraints. Perhaps being the Heir of Breath allowed him to sense electricity? He hefted one arm over his shoulder. “Can you walk?” I winced as I tried to put weight on my right leg. It was still healing, and I could feel it stitching itself back together, sapping my strength to do so.

“I… don’t think so.” The pain of my organs growing back was lessened thanks to the damned restraints being off, but healing was still an intense process. I felt him lift me — strength so gentle, bravery so bold — and hold me in a fireman’s carry. As we left the room, my consciousness began to fade.

***

When I came to, I was in the separate side-room John had built for me to keep me safe. Karkat, white-carapaced and hornless, was watching me. “Thank fucking god,” he murmured. “I’m going to let Egbert know you’re awake. Poor bastard’s been frightened out of his mind, worried that you were going to die from your wounds.” I laughed weakly. My lungs were finally back to full function.

“Can’t die like that,” I whispered. “I’m a god.” Karkat rolled his eyes, and the next thing I knew, John was in here, gently stroking my face as he slowly pulled me into his lap. I smiled up at him. “Sorry to make you worry,” I whispered.

“Apology accepted,” he whispered back. For the longest time, we said nothing; his hand gently caressed my face, his fingers occasionally brushing some hair out of the way, and my hand, holding steady on his face, with the occasional brushing of his earlobe by my thumb.

After a few moments, I looked at him. “The others?” John sighed, helping me move into a sitting position. My energy would be in the gutter for a while.

“I went for Sollux first. He… she did something to his brain, cut something out, and now he can barely speak.” John frowned. “She… she hurt him so bad. And from what I’ve heard, it’s not going to get better ever.” John hugged her. “And then I went to save Gamzee…” John looked down at his shirt. I looked at it for the first time. He had splotches of purple on it.

“He was bleeding?”

“He… I think he remembered me. What I’d done. What _we’d_ done.” He shuddered. “He… he attacked me, and I almost let him kill me, for what I’d done to him… but then I thought about you, and how you needed me…” What seemed like a sob wracked his body. “I… at least it was clean. Ish.” He looked down. “But… I hope I never have to do anything like that again. I’m not Jade. I can’t just kill someone.”

I stroked his face gently. If I’d been able to, I would have kissed him on his forehead. All the human actors did that to calm down people in those movies, must be a cultural thing. Anyway, I just kept stroking, since it was the only thing I could do. “And then you saved Karkat?” I asked quietly.

“Him and Rose at the same time.” He swallowed. “The… the only one missing by then was you. You and Dave and Aradia, but they’ve been gone so long…” I nodded. I really hoped it was just them taking a while. Sure, they had all the time, but temporal stability had to be maintained. “But… I saw Aradia. A lot. She just… every time she was there to distract Jade.” My gaze sharpened as I looked at him. “A… a lot of those times, she died. I don’t think there was one where she didn’t.” Something sank to the pit of my stomach. I’d seen the Daves dying left and right before, whenever he did something stupid that made a branch timeline. It had made me laugh then.

I wasn’t laughing now. “She was trying to correct the past. Keep us from this fate.” I looked at him. “Then, when you got me…”

“She was there. Standing outside the door. She said you were… restrained, that you needed to be freed. When we left, I saw her go down in a hail of gunfire.” I winced.

“She… she sacrificed herself for my sake.” I coughed. I couldn’t help myself. I was on the verge of crying. “We’ve got to stop her,” I whispered.

“I know.” John closed his eyes. “I know. Karkat has a plan, but Dave has to be here for it.” He sighed. “Somehow, I know it’ll be all right.” He wrapped his arms around me, which surprised me. He felt warm and gentle. I couldn’t help but wonder… But John was holding me. We’d make it work out. After all, he was here with me. And that was all the luck I needed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _I don't want the world to see me  
>  'Cause I don't think that they'd understand  
> When everything's made to be broken  
> I just want you to know who I am..._


	9. Broken

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Futile: adj, Incapable of producing any result; failing utterly of the desired end through intrinsic defect; useless, ineffectual, vain. (OED)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And in this chapter, Dave comes in and... can't quite make with the rescue.

Time travel is precise. It is a science. None of this flying off the handle bullshit is allowed. The Knight of Time has to be its keeper. I have to be impartial. I finally get it.

At one time, I was worried the dead Daves would scare Jade. And if it had been Old Jade? Probably would have. I know she was fucking terrified when she pestered me about the doomed past-clone she’d seen snuff it. But then… then came the Scratch, and we were on the other side of the Veil, and something had gone just plain wrong with Jade’s backup or whatever. Maybe resetting without your dream self was so traumatic it did something to your brain, and John’s god-tier bullshit allowed him to resist.

I’m not sure when I realized I couldn’t change whatever had gone down here. Probably about fifteen dead Daves ago. I kept finding them in various states of decay all around, kept cleaning them up when I could… At least four of them had been split open like ripe pumpkins and carved up by some sort of gruesome doctor death. At first I thought it was that fucking juggalo. It’d be like him to do that, I figured. All clowns were creepy-ass monsters. Then I saw him in there. Purple blood spilled everywhere, John holding a tray, Jade laughing as she did all sorts of things to him. I burst in.

I was the first dead Dave. Jade hit me with a scalpel through the brain. John might’ve seen me too, and if it did, I probably scared him. Not sorry, though.

***

After twelve dead Daves I got a timeline down. Five weeks ago, something began that wound up with Dave getting a scalpel through the right eye, tickling his brain. Then came the bullet-ridden one who had about twelve thousand tiny holes dotting his body, at four weeks and six days ago. Another one, later that same day, had gotten some sort of metal hook treatment. That was the only explanation I could think of for the bloodstained teeth and the feeling that he was lacking internal organs.

Four weeks ago, impaled. Three weeks ago, garrote. Two and a half weeks ago, body pretty much pulped — but I knew it was me. You always know your own dead body somehow. It’s a time thing, I think. You get so used to dead you popping up you know him on sight. Two weeks and two days ago, neck snapped. Two weeks and one day ago, burned to death — or, and this was my hope, burned after some other death. Burning to death would be way too fucking painful.

Two weeks ago, stabbed with some sort of steak knife to the gut, and what looked like a fork to the heart. Thirteen days ago, I either vomited to death or was killed in vomit. Twelve days ago, whipped to death. Really don’t want to know the story behind that one. Nine days ago, death by blood loss. I also had my balls ripped off on that one. That one also had the initials JH carved into it, on the heart. I’m not sure why she did it. But I was going to fix this mess. Jade was going to die before she even—

Noir cut my life short in the cold of the Veil. Me alongside Aradia. She probably went to distract him from us. I just got murdered… though me being there probably helped Aradia hold back Noir for long enough for the four of us to reach that asteroid.

***

I couldn’t go back further; I was an echo, a backup. My world pre-scratch didn’t exist. Not that it couldn’t, but… if I’d tried to go back and make it happen, we’d be in deep shit. Daves would pile up, dying left and right. And for what? The chance to ruin this godforsaken game a second time? To fuck up so horribly that our reset button wouldn’t function?

No. I had to face this on my own. Which meant I had to take on Jade. Rewind. Five days. I can do this. I can take her life. I’ve died hundreds of times. I’ll keep her from enacting her horrible plan. Her horrid tortures. I’ll stop Gamzee’s death. Can’t stop Kanaya’s death. But I can stop Gamzee’s.

My blade is out before she can blink twice. She’s got Karkat chained to her wall. I’ll kill her, free him… I’ll be the hero for once, instead of the antihero. Instead of the one who has to go the roundabout way. The one in the shadow of every other fucking man in paradox space. Bro, John, hell, even Karkat. I’m going to one-up them all. I’m going to stop Harley’s reign of terror.

The knife in my stomach feels cold, but it’s not as cold as Jade’s glare. She presses the barrel of a revolver to my throat. “Stop trying to interfere, Dave,” she whispers. “I don’t like having to kill you.”

***

Five more Daves have turned up, of course. I can’t help it. Something about what Harley’s doing is just making me angrier than I’ve ever been. Probably because she wasn’t like this back then. Back when we were playing Sburb. God, that seems so long ago.

I mark them by time of death. There’s a strict one-a-day progression. Shot, stabbed, acid, a “nothing” that’s probably poison, and a combination of lashings and slices. I really don’t want to know what caused that one. By the fifth corpse, I’m angry again. I set the timetables to rewind. Four days ago. By mark, before that day’s death. I see John in the kitchen. He looks pale. I wish I knew what happened to him. Once I’m done with this, I’ll get the full story.

I know Jade’s door will electrocute me (three electrocuted Daves in a near-the-door area tells me this) so I just slice it off its hinges. Three-days-ago-me probably saw that. Jade isn’t in. Karkat is, and Rose is, and they’re both looking horrible. Rose has more cuts and lacerations than the victim of a knife maniac, and Karkat’s still got that freaky-ass white thing going on. I’m still hesitant on asking why.

Not that I get to get the chance, apparently. This’ll be a new one. Will I find my head, or just my body?

***

The count is up to thirty-seven. I’m determined to break through. I’m going to stop Jade, kill her, make her pay for all the Daves she’s slaughtered, all the wounds she’s inflicted on Terezi, and Rose, and John. And the others too, I guess, but mostly those three. I will make her stop.

“Jade,” I say, my voice hard as steel. It’s four days before we returned. Jade sighs. “I’m going to —”

“Kill you,” she says, stealing the end of my sentence. “Fucking hell, Strider. I’ve heard you say that so many times I’ve lost track. And I’m running out of new ways to kill you.” My sword is out and I’m dashing towards her. She’s not fast enough to dodge my flash steps. I’m the master of motherfucking time. I have that shit on lockdown. It’s not going anywhere.

Well, at least I was partly right. I’m not going anywhere with this gaping hammer wound in my gut. Where the hell did she get such a gaudy piece of shit? Most beautiful fucking thing I’ve ever seen, even as it condenses my skull. I think there’s actually a tear in my eye before I shove it.

***

Forty-eight. I’m going to correct this timeline and stop this from happening _no matter what_. I found a note from Rose, practically begging for us to stop the madness. Operation Godhead can wait until Jade’s kicked the bucket. Right now, we can’t have her messing up things with her torture machines. No, we’re going to need something different. Something like… Like a complete and total timeline revision. All the way back to the beginning. But I can’t do that from here. Another me, a future me, is going to have to do that.

From here, I’ll stop Jade’s machinations. I’ll shut her down in the present, and maybe past me can get Equius to make some robot duplicates before clown-face chokes him to death. That should be possible. And then we can get rid of clown-face too, probably, and then we can get back on track for defeating Noir. It’ll be simple. All I have to do is find her. Find her, and kill her.

Finding her is the easy part. The tallest tower, the closed door, the broken window (something happened to that window two days ago from this point in time). She’s in there now, probably doing some sort of horrible experiment. Or going slowly mad. Or…

Or she’s asleep. Perfect timing. I can finish her in one quick blow of the sword. No pressure, Dave. Just kill a sleeping murderess. A sleeping girl. Lying peacefully in her bed. Looking so innocent in that veil of sleep. Looking so forlorn, so sad, so lonely. I’m still not sure what she brought with her, but the book she brought and then read… that’s no good book, of that I’m now sure. Maybe I could take it from her… maybe I could stick it somewhere far away. Yeah. But first, I’d have to kill this Jade. And do it quickly.

…All it takes is for my blade to falter, my muscles to relax, and my weight to shift enough that the floor creaks. Jade bolts up, and for once in my life, I’m disappointed to find out that a girl sleeps naked. Not because I don’t like Jade — I still find her kind of attractive, even if she _is_ off the deep end. No, it’s because seeing her naked kind of blanks out my mind… long enough for her to club me to death with a fucking pool cue. I’m actually kind of embarrassed that my last thought is “titties”.

***

Fifty-nine Daves. That is a ridiculous amount of good-looking corpses. The sixtieth corpse turns up from an hour ago. I think I finally get it. I’ve been trying to change the past, and the dead Daves are really piling up… because I can’t accept the fact that Jade has to do this. That she has to torture and maim and murder. But I won’t let her kill me again. That ship has sailed. No… I’ll find Aradia, find Terezi, and figure out how to implement our plan.

When I found her, Aradia was sitting in a corner, looking winded and disheveled. “Hey, ram’s horns,” I said quietly. Even though she had no clue what our earth animals were she really liked the nickname I’d given her. She gently kissed my cheek and stood up. “We’ve got to find Rez.” Aradia nodded at me. I decided I’d have to let her know about the dead Daves. That pile of Aradia blood on the floor was a bit disconcerting, and I knew she’d tell me when I was good and ready for it.

“I know. I sacrificed other me’s in order to…” She shrugged. “My best guess is we have to find John. He was rescuing the others. He knows exactly what’s been going on.” I nodded, taking her hand. “Unless you managed to go back into the past and see it all?”

“Nah… I figured out the gist of it from the dead Daves, and then built up a lot more of them trying to fight it.” I sighed. “We’re going to have to fight her in the end. It’s going to be so fucking hard. For John it might even be impossible.” Aradia shrugged.

“Either way… I say we leave Jade out of Operation Godhead.” I nodded. That much, at least, was a given. I sighed, turning to a note Rose had left behind for us. I read it over again.

“Dave, please help us. Jade has gone psychotic with no explanation that I can understand, and her behavior has become most gruesome. Please help us as best you can. I am off to challenge her; I pray my allies can help me eke out victory against her.  
-Rose”

I sighed. “Sorry, Rose,” I muttered at the screen. “We can’t change it. We can only help keep it from getting worse.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Say you'll be alright come tomorrow  
>  But tomorrow might not be here for you_


	10. Sacrifice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Martyr: n, one who undergoes death on behalf of any religious or other belief or cause, or as a consequence of his devotion to some object. (OED)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter took a while to write because I had to show every single death. At least, that was how I thought. Also, it has my interpretation of what happens when a Time Player who's reached Godhood creates a branch timeline. As a side note, Aradia does a _lot_ of branch timelines in canon alone, and this adds ten more.

Being a Time God doesn’t give you immunity to Paradox Space’s ridiculous hoop-jumping game. In fact, the situation is quite unusual, because not only do you die from a malformed loop, but you also remember the branch timeline you created. Fortunately it isn’t retroactive… but it does mean that you don’t leave a corpse behind. I could probably sit here and talk about that forever, but dwelling on it is a waste of time… and even for a god, time isn’t something you can just waste.

We arrived at John’s room without incident. John had told me, before I’d died keeping Jade from following him and Vriska, that they’d be there. I’d led her on a wild goose chase across several meteors, and when she finally caught up to me… well… Poolcuekind was a brutal strife specibus.

I opened the door cautiously. Some blindingly white thing — Karkat, I remembered — was looking at me from the other side. “Fucking hell, Aradia. You scared us.” I sighed. “Come in quick, you two. No idea how long it’ll be until Psycho Bitch catches up to us.”

“She’s got two more hours of chasing me to go,” I muttered. “Anyway. We’ve got six hours or so to set the plan in motion. Our plan,” I added, looking at Dave. Karkat nodded. I swallowed. “So… what did she do to you?”

“Long-ass story. We’ll explain after the plan’s gone through. And after Harley’s been killed. Rose got the cause… she’ll be examining it later.” Karkat looked at her. “How the hell do you know that Jade’s going to be gone for six hours? I shrugged uncomfortably. “C’mon, Aradia. Spill.” I looked at Dave, who nodded. And after a deep breath, I began to tell them about all my various deaths since I became a god.

***

My first death was the one I did to distract Jack Noir. He was incredibly easy to deflect. I went back in time, back to a few moments before everyone arrived. Distracted him to the other side of the Veil. I heard the Horrorterrors asking why I was risking myself, why I would throw my life away. I couldn’t tell them. I couldn’t let them know that I was sacrificing some of their lives so that Jack could be destroyed.

And I held him. I held him for hours, until the spell broke and I was too tired to continue, until I couldn’t even move. Everyone was safe, I figured, and I’d saved people from him, so this me could die. It wasn’t that I wasn’t afraid of death — I still kind of was. I just knew that it wouldn’t be as bad as letting Noir have run of everything.

The irony of comparing Noir to Jade is that Jade is sadistic. Picking at people and tearing them apart slowly and delicately. Noir is all about satisfactory murder, quick death. He just beheaded me. That was it. Life over. Game over. And I snapped back to right before I’d gone back in time. Didn’t have to go now. A dead Aradia had accomplished what the living Aradia had set out to do.

Then we skip ahead a few weeks. Dave and I just finished what we were planning for Operation Godhead. It was time to return to the meteor, and as we’re headed back here, we pass under a glittering red trail… my glittering red trail. That was my first sign that I’d be doing some backtracking. Then came the trips down the hallways… and this strange sort of déjà vu feeling.

The first time I aimed for was the day that Rose wrote the note on the computer. It was easy enough. Four days ago. Rose didn’t notice me behind her. I snuck behind her, and pretty soon we were at a diverging path. Rose went one way… and I spotted Jade coming around the other way. If I didn’t distract her, she’d get Rose before… or after… Rose wrote that note. I drew on my time powers to halt her. It froze her for a few minutes, enough time for Rose to turn around the corner, but then somehow she snapped out of it.

I didn’t recognize the power she used. It was like mine, but different. No longer a God of Time’s power, though at one point it could’ve been. It was different. Green, with an aura of smoky fumes. Though I’d never felt it before, it was strangely familiar, and I tried to think of why I might remember it so well. But I had no time to reminisce. Jade had already made her next move.

One of my old whips, a favorite of mine from my adventuring days, wrapped around my throat. Jade dragged me closer, enclosing my neck in tighter and tighter loops. Air was being kept out of my lungs. I could feel my heart pounding. That was when she released me, only to grab my neck and lift me up off the ground. “Something I want to tell you before you die,” she whispered. “You need to stop disappearing on me.” She slammed me into the ground, hand on my throat, crushing it. “It’s incredibly rude to not even leave a corpse for poor little Jade.”

I disappeared, of course. But when I got back, my throat was hurting. Something else had gone down. I jumped back three weeks. Was she like this back then? I had no idea. I was going to find out. And maybe… Well, I knew I couldn’t save people from her, no matter what she’d done. Time must go on. What’s done must remain done. Stable loops are the only way to save the past. And my loops were going to be necessarily unstable. Even this one.

I approached Jade’s room. I could hear John screaming, could hear Jade crying out in joy. I wasn’t sure what was going on in there, but it was probably something horrifying. But if I burst in right then… well, he’d be done for. Or I’d be done for. Or I’d be an experiment. I waited, frightened by the noises, until I heard glass breaking. At that point I moved to open the door… when Jade opened the door herself. She was naked, dripping with some liquid that I presumed to be sweat. She wasn’t about to let me get away with what I’d heard fresh in my mind.

Almost immediately, Eridan’s blue rifle was in her hands. She fired a shot that I easily dodged. I was, after all, a Time God. I sensed the same power in her that I’d seen the first time (from my perspective) we’d fought. I didn’t want to risk having that power deplete me again. So I flitted around, cracking my whip at her, attempting to scar her or hit her face. A dull thud echoed through the room, and Jade pulled out a thin, long rod. I grabbed onto it with my whip, but she yanked on the stick and pulled the whip from my hands before hitting me across the head with the stick. I lost consciousness.

When I woke up, I was in her room again, stripped naked, with my abdomen sliced open. Jade was looking over me. “You know,” she said, “there are so many interesting things about you. These ovaries, for instance! Do they actually work? And why do you have breasts? It’s not like you give live birth and nurse your young.” She prodded at various internal organs, listing what they should do. It was distractingly painful; not only was I having trouble concentrating on my time powers, I didn’t hear most of what she was saying. I did, however, feel her taking something out — something painful — with a mention that she would “run a test”. She grinned at me. “I’m glad you survived! Dave didn’t say before the jump if you’d survived, Kanaya’s no longer functional, Terezi’s not letting me anywhere near her, and John would kill me if I studied Vriska!”

“W-what?” I tried to focus. I could easily slip the bonds if I just used the least of my… A jolt of electricity flowed through my body. “Ergh… what are you doing, you festering nookstain…?” Jade turned the electricity up again. I didn’t make out her reply. It was agonizing, the pain… but not enough to kill me. It was something I could probably eventually get used to. It was straining me.

I was left there for three hours, four minutes, and nineteen seconds before Jade came back, clapping like a giddy grubling. “Oh, how excellent! So much research I’ll be able to conduct on you! …except you have that pesky habit of dodging and ducking and escaping. Regrettably, I guess I’ll have to kill you.” A scalpel cut my blood pump out of my chest. When I came back to myself, I placed a hand over where it had been to make sure it was still there. I felt it beating. Never have I felt so relieved.

I saw a note on Sollux’s old computer. It was written to me, by me. The content was surprising. It was a set of four temporal coordinates in quick succession. I hadn’t written it yet, but it was signed “doomed you #10.” I wondered how many doomed selves I would have to go through to get to that.

Another rewind. Two and a half weeks ago. I was outside a room with a closed door. Jade was glowering at me. She smelled horrible, like onions and garlic and blood, mixed together and blended with the residual smell of a used load gaper. And she was glaring at me. “You. You did this to him.” I backed off; Jade was advancing slowly. “I’ll kill you for what you’ve done to john, you sick, perverted, evil alien being.”

“What do you mean?” I asked quietly. “I haven’t seen John in… in over five weeks.” Jade snarled, drawing two scalpels. Her eyes were filled with a malice I’d never seen, and pulsed a brilliant green.

“It’s something your kind did to him.” She lunged at me; it was so easy to dodge I didn’t even need to dip into my time powers. “Something your little planet-abandoning kind did to him…” I blinked, confused. As far as I knew, nobody had told Jade about how the Alternian military (which basically meant the entire adult population) was off-planet all the time.

“Jade, where did you learn that?”

“I read a book,” she said, feinting with one scalpel while the other tried clumsily to hamstring me. “It told me all sorts of things…. my real friend showed me all the lies, all of them. Exposed all the truths, all of them. Do you know what he said? All universes have to eventually be killed. Such is the way of the world.” With a flick, the scalpel was thrown. Although the range was short, I was able to dodge, so instead of a scalpel in the middle of my forehead, it merely flew past uneventfully.

Amend that. It nicked a horn. She was apparently still able to keep an air of competence. “Your friend?” Jade laughed. “Who is this friend of yours?”

“Oh, I can’t say his name,” she said, grinning. “There’s no sound in any language that could represent his true name. But… He’s a close friend.” She grinned. “And he’s told me all about your time dodging.” I blanched. “Then again, he’s let me watch how to fight you. Over and over.” A stab with her scalpel that I realized too late was a feint as she used another one to pin my foot to the ground. Well, try to pin my foot to the ground. I could still shift away. All I’d have to do was…

It wasn’t working. Why couldn’t my teleport work? I wouldn’t have time to come up with the answer. The gun rifle nestled under my chin. Jade growled at me. “I hope your corpse stays this time, you cunt,” she whispered. “I really want to mutilate it.” Bang. Off went my head. Down went my body. Snap went my mind, back to the present. To the actual me. That made four dead Aradias. I needed two more before I went to those coordinates.

I returned to the day after she’d cut out my blood pump. My chest was still hurting, almost as much as my throat. The wounds weren’t there, but the pain of dying was. I saw Jade walking down a hallway, and against my better judgment, I tailed her.

She went down into the meteor’s depths, through Equius’s portal. The walk was long, but eventually we reached some sort of arena, hidden deep within the confines of the asteroid. The stench of death was heavy in this place, and blood coated the floor. Blood in all sorts of different colors, ranging from Tavros’s to Feferi’s (mine apparently had yet to be spilled there). And on a nearby table… I realized before I’d approached it was someone’s body. And in this case… it was Equius. The month I’d spent with him rushed into my mind. I wanted for it to be a nightmare, but the dream bubbles didn’t allow for nightmares. And besides, when would I have fallen asleep?

I felt something heavy, wet, and sticky hit me on the back of the head. I dropped to the floor and turned to see what it was. There stood Jade, holding a severed arm. Judging by the color of the blood on the arm, it was Eridan’s. “Jade. I see you’re doing well.”

“And I see you’re still alive,” she said. She sounded disappointed. “I was wondering why you’d disappeared.” She swung again, but I could dodge this time. And I even avoided her hitting my horn this time. Some of Eridan’s blood splattered on Equius’s corpse. “Then again… you dodge admirably.” She threw the arm at me. It was an easy side-step.

I’m still not sure how she got so close to me so quickly. After all, Kanaya had told me that manipulating space wasn’t her quest. Several times, in fact. She’d mentioned the frogs over and over again, mentioned how hard it was to clone them, how difficult it had been to breed the Genesis Frog. Bilious Slick, as we’d called him. It was a cute name, and I still don’t think he minded.

That didn’t alter the fact that very soon one of her scalpels was in my side, then withdrawn as she pulled out a weapon that was almost certainly too big for her to hold. It was twice as tall as she was, and then twice that long again. And yet… I saw green envelop her arm. And as it did, she smirked and pointed that monstrosity at me. I dodged the first shot, or would have if it had been a slug. But the fire spread, as if this were some sort of massive shotgun. My arm was torn to shreds by the shrapnel, and when she fired again, faster than she should have been able to, I wasn’t able to doge out of sheer shock.

I remembered snapping back and feeling like half my face had been torn off, as well as a good portion of my insides being perforated. I turned to look at Dave. “Aradia, are you ready?” he asked. I shook my head. I still had work to do. Five more trips. I winced slightly as I pulled out the timeboxes again. Back again. I would go back to those four points, but first I would need to put myself somewhere else. Somewhere where I could keep Jade from… from what? From traumatizing John? From killing Kanaya? I couldn’t keep her from anything. It would be another pointless battle where I’d lose.

Not that I could let that stop me. Just because I was doomed didn’t mean I didn’t have a role to play. And that role was… was… I wasn’t sure. The time I landed at was random, until I realized that it was shortly before Dave and I left. About twenty minutes to departure. Jade’s nose was in a book, and I saw her walking over to where we were. I recognized the cover. It had been in the library of Derse when we were still playing the game. And she was almost done reading it. I had to do something to prevent her from killing us. We were supposed to survive. “Hello, Jade.”

Jade looked up at me. Her eyes were filled with an obsessive light I’d never seen before she’d entered our session. She grinned. It seemed eerie. “Aradia! Aradia, I’ve just read the most wonderful book! It… It explains so much!” She grinned. “Oh, it’s so beautiful! John would love to read this! He’d understand so much! And… I can almost feel a new friend, waiting to meet up with m—”

I put her under a time freeze. Holding her there would be necessary until Dave and I had left. We would be traveling the conventional way, of course, by flying through the space. But I’d have to hold her for another eighteen minutes. That was all the time she had to be held. It was nothing.

Eighteen minutes passed, but I kept the time stop on her. After all, I had to keep her from breaking free and killing me. I had to put up some kind of fight. But as I watched her, her arm began moving. It shouldn’t have been possible. This had been enough power to hold back Jack Noir for almost an hour. I amped up the power behind the spell. It stopped her cold. Still, I wasn’t sure how long I could hold this level of power before I broke. I’d have to try, though. Try and keep her from breaking through.

It was half an hour later when I finally released her. I don’t think she was too happy with me when she was finally freed. She stumbled forward before pulling out Ahab’s Crosshairs. That stupid gun of Eridan’s had been replicated. And now she was aiming it at me. I dove backwards as she fired; I could feel the searing beam pass over my nose. It smelled like burning death and electrical murder. My whip wrapped around the gun and I yanked it out of her hands, smashing the godforsaken thing against a wall. And then…

I still don’t know where she got the pool cue from. I remember, though, that it was the weapon she would later use to steal my whip. I put the whip back in my Strife Specibus. I wasn’t about to give it to her early. She’d have to pry it from my surprised grip later on. No, this was a time for fists and teeth and telekinesis. I was surprised when Jade put the pool cue away and met me head on. I’m glad I could say the fight wasn’t fair. By the time I was done with her, she was hanging on to life by a thread. Her glasses had snapped. Her teeth were red with her blood, and a fair amount of the stuff was leaking from cuts, gashes, and puncture wounds. Sure, she’d gotten a couple hits in on me — a couple bullets to the gut, a punch in the trachea, nothing I couldn’t deal with.

What I hadn’t expected was the hammer crushing my chest in from behind, or John shouting “Jade! Jade, are you all right?!” I wanted to shout at him, tell him that no, he was making a mistake, but my lungs had been pierced by bones and my windpipe was suffering from Jade’s earlier lucky shot. She got up and looked at him.

“She tried to kill me! Just… out of the blue!” John looked at me. I looked at him. My eyes pleaded with him. They begged him not to kill me. And I think, for a few moments, he actually hesitated. But it was enough time for Jade to steady herself, draw a pistol, and put a bullet in my think pan. My sixth death since becoming a god, and it was as ignoble a death as I’d ever suffered.

I looked at Dave. He seemed impatient. “I have to do four more trips,” I said. He nodded. I looked at the list. Someone had edited it. “after you do these, go back in time and help john.” It listed different coordinates, and was signed, “aradia, after we’ve dealt with jade.” I nodded, committing the times to memory. Out came the timeboxes. Back I went to earlier today.

I was outside a room. I could see John and Sollux inside. Coming up on the room was Jade, a fierce look in her eye. “I’m so excited, and I just can’t hide it,” she sang. She was about to pass by the room where Sollux was. I had to distract her. “I’m about to lose control and I think I like it!”

“Jade!” She looked at me, puzzled. “Hello, Jade. You want a piece of me?” She grinned, pulling out that ridiculously-sized shotgun again. “You’re going to have to do better than that,” I said. She fired. But I knew how it spread now. I knew which pellets to stop when so that I could dodge through them. Sollux had had a term for games like this, where you had to dodge a hail of bullets. He’d called it “Don Maku” or something. And here I was, putting it to practical use.

A second thundering, and a third, and a fourth followed. I saw John drag Sollux out of the room and run down the hallway with him. I grinned. Jade had just lost one of her hostages. I let my guard down, which was a mistake, because she’d switched to Ahab’s crosshairs. That gun burned a hole in my stomach.

Out came the timeboxes again as soon as I’d snapped back to my body. Shortly thereafter. Jade was walking down the hall to the kitchen. Probably heading to John’s room. “Hey! Crazy lady!” Jade turned. “Want to know why I keep disappearing? Come on! I’ll tell you if you can catch me!” And I began running, hoping and praying that Jade would follow me.

I stopped outside the room where Jade had been keeping Terezi hostage. “You must really want to know,” I said. “I must be getting on your nerves so bad.” Out came the pool cue. “You’re not going to get the answer out of me with that.” She charged me, swinging the cue. I ducked, sidestepped, and dodged, not wanting to waste any more time power. I was fairly certain I was only draining the actual Aradia’s reserves.

She growled as she shoved the cue in a more complex feint than I could have imagined. I didn’t quite dodge it in time, and the cue’s butt snagged on my horns, allowing Jade to slam me into a wall. I pushed myself off the floor andleapt at her, but it was too late. A pistol of some kind was in her hand now, and it went off, hitting me square in the chest. “You know,” she growled, “I’m not sure I care anymore, so long as you stay dead!” The beating was savage, confined to fists, elbows, knees, feet, and the butts of several rifles. By the end of it, I was bleeding profusely. She looked down at me. “Now stay.” The rifle fired. My think pan spilled onto the floor, staining it with juices for a few brief moments before again I winked out of existence.

I was a mass of pain without the injuries to explain it, but that didn’t — couldn’t — stop me from using the timeboxes a ninth time. Back I went, to a room I recognized as Jade’s. She was humming to herself as she presumably went to check on something. As she saw me, she scowled. “My luck just keeps on getting worse. Why won’t you die, Aradia?” I laughed.

“But Jade,” I said, “I do die! I’ve died eight times already! You just never get a body, do you?” Taunting her probably wasn’t the best option, but I had to do something to make her give chase, and that was the easiest thing I could think of. And chase she did. It wasn’t a fun chase, like I’d had with Sollux several times before we’d both turned six, or an erotic chase, like I’d done with Equius once or twice during our quest. I was running for my life this time, trying to keep from outpacing her. And it was working. I was faster, as well, so I could give John enough time to get two rescues in.

John saw me outside a laboratory — the same one where she was keeping Vriska. “Vriska’s in there,” I said. “Get her out. I’m going to face down Jade.” As John closed the room’s door behind him, hell-bent on rescuing his matesprit, I charged Jade head-on. “We’re not going to take any more of this bullshit! For freedom!”

The Green Sun Streetsweeper opened fire on me. White hot, possibly radioactive god-bullets pierced my carapace in several hundred places. Still, I had to fight her. And that meant a suicidal charge at the last minute. A suicidal charge through a hail of burning lead and acrid smoke. By the time I reached her, my left hand was torn up, my right arm was ripped off entirely, and my beautiful horns were spilling blood despite being cauterized. “RAAAAARGH!” My battle cry was ferocious, and even though the butt of the Streetsweeper knocked out several of my teeth, I leapt onto her, shoving the remains of my left hand into her right eye. It made a squelching noise as it went in, crushing the human organ.

“Fuck you, you parasite-ridden grayskin,” she growled as she rolled on top of me, shoving a smaller pool cue, almost like a dagger, into my chest. “I’m going to cut you open until you bleed out, and then when you come back again, I’m going to finish the fucking job I fucking started!” The cue began frenzied stabbing; I’m not sure how long I lasted, but it wasn’t more than ten stabs.

When I snapped back, I vomited blood. It wasn’t pretty, and I’m fairly certain Dave tried to stop me, but I pushed him away. Dave didn’t need to deal with a vomiting matesprit (a part of me choked on that; he was a human, he didn’t even know what a bucket was for, and we’d lost our Mother Grub). I pulled out the timeboxes and shifted back to the final one. This one would be easy. All I had to do was distract Jade one last time. Get everyone to a place where we could set up.

Jade saw me and whipped out the Streetsweeper again. I disappeared to right behind her, tapped her on the shoulder, and then began to fly off… off away from the meteor. I knew she was furious about a lack of my corpse. I just had to fly away three hours. Three hours out, and she could kill me, and it still wouldn’t stick.

Off I flew. Away into the sky, off near where the Land of Quartz and Melody had once stood. Back where I had once been a ghost frog in a robot shell. I made sure to make it a three hour trip. That turned out to be fairly easy, as my trajectory would take me all the way across Skaia from where I had been. I stopped in the rubble of my former world. Jade arrived there, growling. “It ends now, Aradia. You are going to stay put.” I grinned. She pulled out the Streetsweeper again. But I was ready.

The bullets flashed past, whizzing by with the power of the green sun. But out here, I could move in three dimensions. I could move up and stay up. And I could move all around and stay there while I wrapped my whip around the god-gun and threw it away. Out came that ridiculous oversized shotgun again. My whip went around that and pulled it away as well. Then came the pool cue. I grabbed onto it with my whip, and when Jade tried to yank the whip from my hands, I kept my grip, flying up close to her. I put the whip away. Jade grabbed onto one of my horns, and I grinned. “Go ahead,” I said. “Kill me. I know you want to.”

She dragged me to the Battlefield, to the place where we had confronted, and ultimately defeated, the Black King. It was me against her, the god-girl against the demon-lass. I knew now that a familiar demon had her in his grip. “You know… you just had to do it, didn’t you. You just had to provoke me.” The pool cue was out again, and it slammed against my head. I grinned as it caught on my horns. Her eye socket was still bleeding. She would be easy to hurt now. She slammed me to the ground, but I still swept with a leg, bringing her down with me. As we both got up, I threw the pool cue aside and rushed her. While she managed to catch me before I could tackle her, I responded with a headbutt. I could see her forehead bleeding. Her knee rose sharply, hitting me in my breathing catch.

A foot to my instep, then up to my groin. She was fighting dirty, and combined with the pains I’d already been feeling from my deaths, it was overwhelming. “Aradia… stay.” A rifle nestled against my forehead as I panted, still feeling the pain in every part of my body. The gunshot, mercifully, wasn’t painful in the slightest.

***

“So… an hour from now, Jade beats the tar out of you and shoots you,” said Karkat. I nodded. “And then, she fucking comes back here, missing an eye and bleeding from the forehead, and we’re supposed to kill her.” I nodded again. “What the fuck book did she read?” I swallowed slightly.

“Secrets of the Damnéd One’s Existence,” I said. The pain was more bearable now. “All about an entity… well, I only know of the demon from secondhand accounts. I have only the word of a mysterious man who types in white to go on.” Rose and Vriska gasped slightly. “This demon… is his master.” I looked at all of them. “Now then. Let’s begin Operation Godhead.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _You were bold and strong and ready to begin your life  
>  All for nothing were you sacrificed  
> You began alone and so it will be when you die  
> All for nothing, will you be remembered?  
> You did decide..._


	11. Collapse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Justice: n, The quality of being morally just or righteous; the principle of just dealing; the exhibition of this quality or principle in action; just conduct; integrity, rectitude. One of the four cardinal virtues. (OED)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It ends here. It ends now.
> 
> And then afterwards, who will pick up the pieces?

I looked at everyone. “Now… the Green Sun is going to explode soon, relative to our time. This helmet will channel the energy from the explosion and use it to recreate your quest cocoon or bed and your dreamself, should yours no longer exist, or should you currently be using it as your extra life, and send you straight to God Tier. That way, we can all defeat Bec Noir. And after that, we’ll find a new universe. I imagine we’ll be able to get to one whose creators either died or don’t care about it anymore. Everyone clear?” They all nodded. I grinned. “All right. Sollux, you’re first. You might feel a slight… sting.”

***

Her corpse had disappeared again — AGAIN — again she was gone — GONE — and that made me so angry — SO ANGRY — and she had no idea and I was this close to calling Noir but no don’t because if you do then John and Karkat and Dave will die and then you won’t be able to take them into a dying universe and create new life throughout time and duplicate him — HIM — your new friend — FOREVER — and jade — JADE — poor little Jade lonely little Jade friends all completed their quests and left you behind and Rose was so dangerous with the horrorterrors and John was a god and Dave was well Dave was Dave and everything was wrong because you were the best you were the one whose grandfather found the code that became sburb and you were supposed to be the one who

And John — BROtheR — john i love you I LOVE YOU SO fucking much AND THEY HURT YOU and i won’t let them I WON’t lET THEm they can’t CAN’T DO IT to hurt you EVEN MORE and ROSE you like rose but ROSE IS EXTRANEOUS even though she could have use but no NO no sharing john NEVER sharing john maybe sharing dave YES DAVE HER BROTHER share him with her if she’s good but she’s bad so very bad I can’t let you have him if you’re a bad girl and Rose you’re a bad girl and I will kill you I will kill you like your mother was killed by noir and at least it was something familiar I KILLED MY GRANDFATHER because a TROLL an EVIL TROLL they conTROLLED BECQUERel and thaT CAUsED me sO MUCHPAIN so much pain and it hurts it hurts help me HELP ME take away the pain

***

Aradia said something about feeling a sharp sting. I didn’t expect for the helmet to blow my fucking head off. But then again, I didn’t have the lisp when it stopped, so I guess I’d gotten used to not having it. It was strange. I was standing there, with fairy wings, in a black outfit with my planet’s symbol on it. The Symbol of Doom, emblazoned in white. It looked a bit like an eye. My eyes weren’t really restored, but my nose was going crazy. I guess that’s better than nothing. And I was the first one. I almost wonder if my old corpse was there.

***

my new friend is so considerate

he doesn’t care that i love my brother

or that i want his babies

or that i think rose is a mean person

my new friend is nice like that

who is my new friend

well i would tell you but he says you’d go insane if you heard his name

***

Sollux’s mustardy blood was all over the floor, right next to a Sollux corpse. The Sollux that was standing there next to the corpse was wearing black, and smelled like licorice and lusus skin. It was a comforting smell. That was when they fitted me with the strange helmet. I smelled burning smoke, I felt electricity pulsing through my body, I felt myself dying. It hurt.

But when the pain stopped, I smelled myself lying slumped on the ground, singed… and I could feel wings growing out of my back.

***

you all lied to me — ME — and you used me and you made me do such HORRIBLE THINGS horrible things horrible horrible you made me clone frogs with NO PURPOSE and no goal and no purpose and when we finally finished did i have a god frog NO I DIDN’T AND IT WAS aLL Your fAULt ALL OF IT and i was going to be SO ANGRY but i kept it in because i am a good friend not like you lalonde or you strider or even you john but john i love you even if you are a bad friend you are the best lover a girl could ask for

karkat i forgive you too for being such a rAGING JACKass because i was hardLY ANY BETTER when i was making the goddamn GOD FROG and the frog GOD THE FROG I HATE THESE FUCKING FROGS i was going to cram it down your throat but i came up with a better idea CALL PRINCE CHARMING TELL HIM TO CRAM A TOAD UP HIS DICK that ought to make me feel better all these tadpoles sitting in water and here’s prince dave with a case of frog groin i’m gonna murder you aradia you and your time traveling corpse i am going to kill your corpse and keep it from moving YOU WILL DIE i will kill you

***

I don’t remember being fitted with the fucking thing. I remember it being activated, and feeling my blood pump stop, though. Shit was fucked up. Especially since after I collapsed I was back and good as new. Although did the Blood uniform really have to be that nauseating shade of green? Really? I mean, hell, even my mutant blood is better than this shitty-ass neon lime green whatever the hell it is.

***

i want to sing a song to everyone

let them know that i forgive them

for all their selfishness

even if they can’t hear me

because i cut off their ears

and used their skins for drumheads

***

I can’t say I was surprised at Strider volunteering me to go before him. He always did have a rather endearing fear of death, even temporary death. I think it would be looking at his own corpse that would frighten him the most. Then again, I had seen dead Dave clones pop up throughout our stay here.

The device was fitted easily, and the next thing I knew, I was burning, turning to ash, and then next to the pile of ashes that had once been Rose Lalonde stood a beautiful goddess. Me. Two of light love one of breath. I suppose it’s not that hard to understand. After all… as dorky as he is, John has a certain… something about him.

***

this is taking forever FOREVER can’t you speed up time friend i mean what good are you as a friend if you can’t speed up time TIME IS IMPORTANT every second counts they’re planning something plotting something plotting to take john away from me TAKE HIM AWAY FOREVER and the trolls are there so they can do it THEY CAN DO IT why can they do it why am i here — HERE — here we go just around skaia and then two more hours and i’ll be safe at the lab and then — THEN — then THEN we can kill them all and it’ll be good and decent and safe and john will love me HE WILL LOVE ME I WILL MAKE him loVE ME

you cannOT STOP HIM from loving me i am his SISTER and his WIFE And that iS HOW IT SHOULD WORK isis loved osiris and she was his sister and wife and THAT WAS GOOD and now we are here and I LOVE JOHN I LOVE YOU even if you don’t love me I WILL MAKE YOU LOVE ME and then i will be happy and you will LEARN how to be happy — HAPPY LIKE ME — and our happiness will spread and you will be one of my ETERNAL SERVANTS and i will have all the power of my friend because he will make me HIS EQUAL that is why he left me with some of his power TO TEST ME and i won’t fail i WON’T FAIL NEVER never fail

***

Coolkids don’t die. That was the first rule Rez and I had come up with. So the fact that I had to die was pretty much the kicker. And I was nervous as fuck. I mean, three bodies, one headless, and a pile of ash. What was gonna happen to me? Still, I couldn’t let that fear show. I strapped on the helmet like a motherfucker and waited for death.

Next thing I know my throat’s slit somehow and I’m bleeding out and my leg has this deep-ass cut in it and I’m bleeding even more and then everything stops. Everything stops and I’m good. I’m wearing a red hood like Aradia. And then we all look at John. And I step up to him, and I say “John? John… you gotta do this.” And he nods. I don’t think he realized quite what he had to do until now. We were all gods now, sure. But Jade was able to take on gods. We just had to make sure that John got to her in time to strike the killing blow.

***

my friends all died once because i couldn’t save them

it was because a troll killed john

but he forgave her

i never did

***

I shifted my weight uncomfortably. Zillyhoo was in my hand, and I was waiting for Jade to return. She’d done so much wrong. She’d even violated me horribly. But… she was still my sister. Could I really kill her? Would I hesitate? I had hesitated with Aradia. And Aradia had wound up dead. But Jade was still my sister, no matter what Karkat said. She was my sister, and family sticks together.

Still, I stepped forward. Jade was tinted slightly green, but it wasn’t like when she’d hefted the punt gun one-handed, or tied Gamzee to the wall. Back then, she’d been glowing. Now, she was just… green. I could see her eye socket bleeding, could see reddish-green blood flowing from her forehead. It frightened me. “John?” She grinned at me. “John! Oh, John, I knew it! You love me! You abandoned them to join with me! Oh, John, I love you!” I steeled myself. She ran towards me. I had to say something. I had to tell her…

“No.” Jade skidded to a halt. “No, Jade. I… I don’t. You… you hurt me. You… you did something I can’t forgive. And you hurt our friends.” I lifted the hammer. I could feel the others walking up behind me. “You hurt our friends! You said that was something no friend should ever do!” I pointed my hammer at her. “So… I’m going to kill you.” Her eyes widened. A pool cue appeared in her hands.

“Kill me? John wants to… kill me?” She stared at me like I was some kind of animal. I didn’t know how to respond, except to move to fight her.

***

no it can’t be the trolls corrupted you JOHN YOU ARE A HUMAN and i am a human but i am also a girl a GIRL JOHN and i love you it is LOVE it is purer than ANYTHING ANYTHING IN THE WORLD and you throw it aside like garbage well i will KILL YOU FOR THAT but no john i love you i can’t kill you no don’t make me kill you john i won’t like to kill you i can see the real you on the inside you love me you know i love you and you love me WHY WON’T YOU LOVE ME please john love me i don’t want to hurt you i don’t want to hurt you and they’re lying THEY ARE LIARS JOHN snap out of it snap out of it remember we were in love we brought heaven and earth together for a brief moment and it was bliss it was BLISS AND WONDER AND BEAUTY

no i can’t kill you i can’t this is all THEIR FAULT i will show them the power of the green sun once more i am going to pull out the streetsweeper and it will kill them all YOU INTERLOPERS WILL DIE and then i’ll take john and i will show him that I LOVE YOU JOHN MORE THAN ANYONE ELSE COULD and i love you and love LOVE love LOVE FLOWS FURTHER AND FASTER AND WHY why why isn’t this gun working it’s not firing it’s not working WHY

***

The green gun she’d pulled out upon leaping backwards and putting away the pool cue didn’t fire. I saw a white, sun-like insignia on the side of it. Perhaps it had taken power from the Green Sun? That would explain why it didn’t work. I rushed her. Zillyhoo was in my hand. I had to do it. I had to kill her. As I rushed her, I closed my eyes and swung.

When I opened them again, I saw Jade smashed against a wall, her skin back to its usual color. She was bleeding heavily. Heavily enough that she was about to die. I dashed over to her. “Jade…”

“John…” she whispered. “I… I still… love… you…”

***

death wasn’t something i wanted

or was supposed to do

i’m sorry my friend

i wasn’t ready for your power

***

I looked at John. My mind hurt. I loved him still, even though he’d killed me. Killed me for the trolls, and for Rose. Why did he love Rose, but not me? What was wrong with me? I wanted to ask him. I wanted to cry into his shirt. I wanted to kill all of them. But in the end, all I could do was look at him. What wrong had I done in his eyes? I pushed out one last word. “Why?”

***

I knelt behind John as he began crying. My hand never touched his shoulder, never even tried. She’d brought up memories painful to him. A woman’s touch was the opposite of what he needed. Noir could wait. He’d probably seek us out. I would talk to John afterwards. Help him, if he needed it. He probably would. I looked over at Rose, who nodded. Good. I wasn’t used to helping people. But this time around, Vriska Serket wasn’t going to hurt her matesprit. I promised myself, and then did something that I’d honestly never thought of before. I challenged myself to keep that promise until the day I died.

I hope I keep it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _This is the way the world ends  
>  This is the way the world ends  
> This is the way the world ends  
> Not with a bang, but a whimper  
> _


	12. Profile

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Psychosis: n, Any kind of mental affection or derangement; esp. one which cannot be ascribed to organic lesion or neurosis. (OED)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter's a bit different from the others. However, the beginning of it was a bit difficult to write. I'm not normally one to write psychiatric diagnoses and such, and so it took a little bit of effort to really get it. And even then I'm not really confident how well that part turned out. Most of the chapter is really the notes... which is also a bit lighter than the rest of the story. Enjoy.

**Subject: Jade Harley  
Report Filed By: Rose Lalonde  
Report Filed On: June 12, 2009 or equivalent.  
Subject’s Previous Mental History: Jade Harley seems to have had a well-adjusted childhood, considering the following facts: She was raised by a canine, her grandfather died when she was a young child, and she had been receiving dreams of Skaia for most of her life (speculation: since age six?) Most recent psychotic episode began upon reading of a book pilfered from Derse library entitled “Secrets of the Damnéd One’s Existence”, which if the first page is to be believed is a tome concerning the summoning and history of a great and powerful demon. While I have had the book burned, I will note that I felt a very strong compulsion to keep reading until I felt the familiar presence of the Horrorterrors push against it, allowing me to place the book aside.  
Symptom 1: Subject has, for the past five weeks, exhibited an intense and unrelenting obsession with one John Egbert, demonstrating an extreme desire to engage in an incestuous relationship with him.  
Symptom 2: Subject has, for the past five weeks, shown an extreme disregard for sapient life and/or the health of others.  
Symptom 3: Subject has admitted to certain delusions of being, for instance, the only sane or sapient being, or the idea that others were animals.  
Symptom 4: According to an interview with one Karkat Vantas, she regarded the others as furniture or, in the case of Dave Strider, John Egbert, and possibly Karkat Vantas, breeding stock. The interview will not be released due to Mr. Vantas’s request, although he has allowed for this piece of information to be released.  
Symptom 5: The subject has committed at least one cold-blooded murder; it is unknown whether other murders of doomed time-clones were similarly cold-blooded.  
Symptom 6: John Egbert has personally testified to the subject’s violent sexual assault. Said testimony will not be released due to emotional distress.  
Conclusion: Due to the subject’s callous nature to her criminal activities and her disconnect from the entire world, it is the opinion of this expert that reading said book caused the subject to become overwhelmed by psychosis, including but not limited to narcissistic personality disorder and paranoid schizophrenia. While these diagnoses are normally reserved for adults and the expert does not, in fact, have a copy of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual on hand, and the expert may, in fact, have been a victim of hers, this expert is still confident in her diagnosis.  
Other Notes:**

12.6.2009: I am fully aware that this is short. I’m not sure any of us can bear to spend much time on the events of the past five weeks. I had a difficult time writing as little as I did.   
JUN3 TW3LFTH: I C4N S33 TH4T, L4LOND3. W3’LL T4LK 4BOUT TH1S DUR1NG YOUR S3SS1ON W1TH M3. FOR NOW, THOUGH, 1’LL JUST S4Y 1 4GR33 W1TH YOUR D14GNOS1S.   
june 14: finally something of yours thats not a fucking epic romance or some shit like that. and yeah gotta agree with hella rez there you sound spot fuckin on. speaking of which i think im supposed to meet up with her for counseling. nothing personal rose but id rather not have my sister doing my psychiatric bullshit.   
15.6.2009: It’s not a problem, Strider. In fact, I’m somewhat glad that I don’t have to bear the responsibility of healing everyone. I have the utmost confidence in her psychiatric ability, given her knowledge of the inner workings of the mind. I wish you well in your session.   
JUNE 16: STRIDER YOU GODDAMN DICK STAY THE HELL AWAY FROM MY MATESPRIT. SHE’S MINE, NOT YOURS.   
june 16: oh sorry i wasnt aware it was national listen to tools day. oh wait its not. what rez and me do behind closed doors is none of your business you dumb fuck. wait a minute are you coming on to me with your weird hate sex thing.   
June 18: He pro8a8ly is! ::::O   
june 18: yeah, that’s what it looks like.   
june 19: i gotta agree.   
june 19: son of a bitch. even you egbro. not cool man not cool. although i suppose i could go ironic and be all troll hate sex up in this bitch.   
JUNE 20: STRIDER WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU GOING ON ABOUT? …OH GOD. YOU GUYS HONESTLY THINK I THINK THIS RETARDED ALIEN TOOL IS MY FATED KISMESIS?   
june 21: kind 0f, yeah, kk. it’s n0t like he’s all that unwilling t0 recipr0cate and y0ur jeal0usy 0ver tz’s redr0m w0uld be a nice p0int 0f rivalry. s0 yeah, i can definitely see it.   
22.6.2009: Can we please stop using my notes on Harley’s insanity as a romantic exploration forum? These notes are beginning to take away from the gravity of the report. Karkat, Dave, whatever you two decide, please keep it out of my notes. This has gone on long enough.   
23.6.2009: This includes writing on the folder itself, everyone. We have functioning vocal cords. Let’s use them.   
june 24: ok one last thing ive gotta add. and this is i still think its bullshit that a book could cause all this to happen. i mean i dont read books but honestly its fucking paper with words printed on it. what really happened.   
june 25: dave, that book was in derse’s library. and apparently told about the summoning of vriska’s adversary’s master. mere knowledge of whom can drive someone insane. i know. i’ve spoken to the man about it. he seemed rather eager to speak with me. his master is apparently some time-traveling demon who feasts upon dead universes. i suppose an entity with power like that could quite easily reach into a finished sgrub session and reach into the mind of an insecure human child.   
june 25: yeah, i’d suggest y0u listen t0 y0ur matesprit, dave. she kn0ws what she’s talking ab0ut. 0h wait s0rry rs.   
25.6.2009: Dave, Aradia’s assumptions regarding the book seem to be accurate. I recently decided to enquire this informant regarding said tome and he agreed that his master probably could reach out through it into the mind of another if, somehow, it contained a reproduction of his true name. I am unsure how the author would have found this information out, but I suspect it is encoded into every session influenced by a universe where he has dominion. At any rate, I kindly insist that everyone please stop writing in my notes. Thank you, good day.   
June 26: Lalonde, I thought we agreed not to talk to him 8ecause it’s him that started all this muscle8eastshit. Why are you talking to him????????   
26.6.2009: Vriska, it was merely one question. I was not going to contact him again. In fact, I will smash my white oracle this afternoon.   
June 26: I’ll 8e coming over to see if you did. And now I’ll stop writing.   
JUN3 30: OH MY GOD ROS3 SM4SH TH3 D4MN OR4CL3 4LR34DY. 1T’S NOT TH4T H4RD.   
July 1: Success!!!!!!!! Rose just 8roke it. Finally. I think we can finally put all this 8ehind us.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _I remember when  
>  I remember, I remember when I lost my mind  
> There was something so pleasant about that place  
> Even your emotions have an echo in so much space_


	13. After

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Heal: v, To make whole or sound in bodily condition; to free from disease or ailment, restore to health or soundness; to cure (of a disease or wound). (OED)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It never really goes away, when you're wounded that deeply. You can move forward, and the wounds will heal, but you're always changed in some way.

**Dave**  
You never really lose the terror that comes from seeing your dead body. Dave knew it, Aradia knew it, and he was willing to bet that everyone else knew it by now. True, it had probably hurt his mind slightly, seeing the pile of dead Daves, almost sixty of them. But… they were gone now. Off in a world left behind. And he and Aradia had figured out how to get into a new universe… one whose creators had abandoned it. They’d be able to live on a planet as long as they wanted. All eight of them, the survivors. He wasn’t about to let Gamzee’s death go by without an ironic 40.

The new world was nice. One sun, beautiful enough to rise above the horizon and dim enough that the trolls could stand its light. Two moons, shining blue and red in the heavens. Dave guessed that there had been a Breath god and a Time god in this session. And in a world like this, you could probably live forever if you wanted. And Dave definitely wanted.

Dave figured he could live with the developments. Things were going all weird human-troll hybrid, what with the multiple girlfriends-boyfriends thing and the whole lack of buckets being apparently an issue for the trolls. But… Dave could handle it. He could handle a lot of things.

The shocks and horrors were still there, of course. The dream bubbles had all popped, and they’d begun having “normal” dreams. Dave had been plagued by nightmares for a while. Nightmares of dying, of Jade standing over him and saying “I love you” before impaling him on some rusty meathook, of Noir’s blade flashing through him over and over again until he was nothing but a skeleton and a scalp. That hadn’t happened, of course, and once the Green Sun had blown up Jack was so easy to take it was hard to believe they’d ever been afraid of him.

Still, he’d been getting better about it. A year had passed, and the traumas had faded. The nightmares were less frequent now. The world was full of hope and beauty. Dave smiled as he sat on the hillside, watching their town take shape. They’d begin growing food eventually… but for now, they didn’t care if they ate, now did they? They were gods. Hunger wasn’t going to kill them.

 **Aradia**  
If seeing your own corpse is horrifying, living through your own death is a nightmare few can comprehend. And Aradia did it willingly. The pain from her encounters with Jade never fully went away. True, it had subsided after she’d died, but sometimes her throat would start hurting for no reason, or she would get a sudden headache where, in a doomed Aradia’s time, Jade had fired a killing blow. The times the remembered pains came were random.

She could live with it. She had Dave, and she had Sollux. And those two could see her through anything. After all, half a sweep healed a lot of wounds, even the psychic wounds. True, she would remember seeing the eerie green glow in Jade’s eyes for the rest of her life, but that hardly mattered now. After all… the demon wasn’t coming to their world. Not so long as she and Dave stood sentinel.

 **Sollux**  
Brain injuries usually take a long time to heal. And even if Sollux’s injuries didn’t heal as slowly as other brain injuries normally do, he still had to go through a readjustment phase to re-learn language he’d forgotten, or skills she’d cut out. The psionics were a bitch to re-master, because the only one who could help him with them was Aradia.

But he had her, and he’d grown close to Rose through her therapy. It had been odd, having her teaching him how to speak, and their first kiss had reminded him of his flushed feelings for Aradia. Feelings that he was now acting on again. A second red relationship was, admittedly, no replacement for blackrom, but it was something to start with.

Even so. Terezi’s lessons about blindness had helped, as his sense of smell could now rival hers. And that was important when you were helping to exercise your psionic powers by building. True, he couldn’t lift the really heavy cross-beams quite yet, but he was gaining progress rapidly. Rose liked to speculate it was something trying to blot out the trauma in what she called a “stereotypical masculine power identity” something something blah blah blah. Sollux didn’t really care. If his psionics recovering meant he’d stop having the nightmares sooner, that was all the better.

Sopor slime didn’t exist anymore. But the horrors of old Alternia hadn’t plagued his dreams in a long while. The nightmares that had sapped his energy, and possibly everyone else’s (he was no mind-reader) were of Jade, with her scalpels and her bone saws and the impromptu surgery. The charnel smell that she sometimes had entered with. Fright was something he’d have to live with.

But it had been a solid sweep. He shouldn’t have to worry about things like that anymore. And, truth be told, he probably wouldn’t. After all, he had two red sweethearts who didn’t mind him being double-red (and he had a feeling Aradia was actually more comfortable with it than him or Rose). He smiled as he looked up at the sky, smelling the brilliant moons. For once, everything was beautiful again.

 **Terezi**  
Sensory deprivation can mess a person up horribly, even if they’re prepared for it. Terezi was unprepared, and even with the ascension to Godhead and the power of Mind that came with it, she was still unable to get things quite as right as possible for a while.

The slime had kept the evils away. The nightmares, the racial heritage of horror and mayhem and disruption that had plagued their race back in their old universe. Back when she was still young. Now there was no slime, and although the horrors of old Alternia were no more, the horrors of losing her mind, of slipping into oblivion, of the green burns of Jade’s mind… those stalked her nightmares. The green light was worst of all. She still didn’t know what it was. Vriska and Rose were frustratingly tight-lipped on the matter.

But she had a matesprit and a kismesis to help her work through things. True, the rivalry she shared with Vriska was tempered by a caution to avoid losing her. That same caution should have been applied more carefully when she had left to face Jade. She should have stopped her, should have been able to stop her… but in the end, Serket does as she pleases. And Terezi knew that.

And her matesprit… She held him close when he woke up sweating, dreaming that his horns had been lopped off, or that he had been bleached, or whipped, or mutilated, or killed. Karkat needed to know she was there. That she would always be there. And she would reassure him. It had been a sweep and a half now, since the nightmare ended. And she would help make sure that nothing like it arose again.

 **Rose**  
The first thing she had done once they'd gotten to their new world was smashed her Magic Cue Ball. True, it was a wondrous mystical object, powerful and able to predict anything the future told her. But it reminded her of Scratch, and thanks to what Aradia said, he was now a reminder of Jade. She hadn’t really liked him, to be honest… but he had been, for better or worse, a confidante. Someone she could trust her problems to.

Learning to rely on other actual, fallible people to fill that role — learning to trust those who weren’t omniscient, didn’t know her inside and out — had been difficult. Sollux was of great intellect, and that helped tremendously, and John… somehow she always had an easier time coping with everything while he was around. Even the deaths of their parents and her subsequent death had been easier to deal with when that lovable goof had been at her side.

Trust issues aside, the nightmares had plagued her for a long time. Too long, she’d say. She was almost seventeen now. They were supposed to be gone by now. Or, at the very least, less frequent. And yet, the nightmares were unrelenting. The knives, the scalpels, the removal of her organs. It was better when a lover shared her bed. But that had been a recent development, and it had mostly been Sollux — John still slept alone, for the most part.

Rose supposed that this was part of growing up. Learning how to heal properly was still something she was trying to do. And when John was ready… until then, she’d wait for him. She’d waited seventeen years. She could stand to wait a little longer.

 **Karkat**  
Until we’re put in the situation ourselves, we never really know how far we can go to protect the ones we love. Whenever the memory arose, Karkat reminded himself that Terezi had been in danger. It didn’t excuse what Jade had done to him, or lessen the pain, but it gave him the strength to carry on while he was awake.

But even two and a half sweeps later, the nightmares kept waking him up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat. When he was awake, the lash and the file were only memories, horrible things that were gone forever. But in the world of dreams, the knife’s bite and the lye’s burn were real, and more exaggerated. The lye seeped into his blood, and it burned; the lash cut through his flesh and plucked out his bones.

It was on those nights he was thankful for his matesprit. She was beautiful, a perfect catch, both in terms of beauty and in terms of brains, even if her eyes didn’t work anymore. And having a kismesis helped; shitty Dave may have been as one, but at least he seemed to take it seriously enough when the mood struck him. And he was willing to be sexual, something Karkat appreciated.

He was eight and a half now, or so. The nightmares were growing less frequent as he slept close to Terezi, even if when he awoke she wasn’t lying beside him, but playing some futile dice game against Vriska. But at least she would always be there for him. That was a gift he would probably be trying to repay for the rest of his life. However long immortality lasted. It would probably be a while. But he didn’t care if he was in her debt forever, if it meant he could be with her.

 **Vriska**  
In the end, luck doesn’t matter. We act along our flaws and our virtues. And pride, in the end, is always the hardest flaw to control. Vriska learned that when she tried to take on Jade. Her death wasn’t Just. It wasn’t Heroic. It was Foolish, which was one of the deaths she was protected against. And it was why she was still here at nine sweeps.

She had settled into the familiar pattern of being Terezi’s kismesis, and kept up her assistance of John. Rose was helpful in that regard, and the two of them bonded over their mutual care for him. Not that they consummated red passions; Vriska was, unlike John, flushedly monogamous, and Rose had something going on with Sollux anyway.

She had been spending more nights in John’s bed. He didn’t seem to mind as much, now, and when she woke up with phantom pains and the vision of those white-hot lead bullets striking her body over and over again, there was John, lying beside her, comforting her. She wondered what was in his nightmares, and would go to sleep holding him tightly, or watching him hold Rose close, or sometimes there with the both of them. It felt good to be pressed so close against her matesprit.

It had been three sweeps since she had promised herself to take care of him. She had kept that promise for three more sweeps than she’d ever kept any promise in her life. And yet, somehow, it felt rewarding to know that she was protecting her protege, keeping him safe from a horrible memory. It filled her with hope. And that was more powerful than all the luck she’d ever had. All of it.

 **John**  
It’s an incredibly traumatizing thing, to take a life. This is doubly true when the life you take is one of your closest friends. And it becomes almost unbearable when you break the bonds of family. At least, it does if you’re sane. John would never have wished what he went through upon anyone. It hurt, even ten years after it had finished. He looked out at the sunrise, thinking about the reasons why he wasn’t an empty shell by now.

The first was Rose. He’d known her for a long time, compared to the trolls. She was the first one Jade had introduced him to, and the memory of it brought an ache to his heart. Jade was his friend back then. A goofy girl who’d been quite energetic and helpful. A good person. Even when playing Sburb she’d been happy and upbeat. Well, all right, perhaps there were instances of rancor, but that was due to her getting stressed out by Karkat or by Bec Noir or by some other force. It wasn’t her fault.

John stopped focusing on Jade and started thinking about Rose again. She was smart, and funny, and witty, even if her taste in movies was a bit weird. And when he held her in his arms, which he did more frequently now (Rose wasn’t going to do that to him, Rose would ask if he would be all right with it beforehand) he could feel the tensions of the day melt away. And when he kissed her, there was always the barest hint of desire, mixed in with love and understanding. He loved her. He knew that now.

But he loved Vriska as well. She had been there for him. He had protected her when the others were in danger. He had stopped her from flying off to face Jack Noir. He had helped her try to live a more human life, without all the need for death and killing. And she’d been willing to learn, more willing than the others. And her gray carapace felt more like skin. Her gray skin, her gentle lips, her right eye with its seven pupils. Her horns, so wonderfully smooth and beautifully colored, felt right when he ran his hands along them.

And when she slept alongside him, when they finally fell asleep together… John felt comforted that his mentor was alongside him, and that his friend was with them. Both Rose and Vriska deserved better than him, he firmly believed, but both of them loved him. And that, in the end, was all he wanted. It was all he needed. The two of them loved him, and in his heart, he knew: that was all he needed.

The scars still hurt. The pain never really went away. But with those two by his side, and his friends supporting him, he would be able to endure. He would be able to be strong, to survive. To thrive on this new world they’d created.

 **Child**  
Anna Egbert looked at the photo book her Daddy had. There was Mr. Dave and Miss Aradia and Mr. Karkat and Miss Terezi and Mr. Sollux and Also-Mommy, and there, in the center photo, were Mommy and Daddy and Also-Mommy, standing there in a lovely suit and two lovely dresses. And Also-Mommy had a beautiful hairband, while Mommy’s hair was so long. She reached up into her own hair; Mommy had said she might not grow horns, even though she really wanted a pair. But she had Mommy’s hair, and Daddy’s eyes, and beautiful purple blood.

And she flipped through more pages, saw her first birthday, saw her little brother’s birthday (Daddy called him a half-brother, but there was a whole Mikey there, so he couldn’t be a half a brother)… and she saw other pictures. Mr. Dave with a lady who looked like Daddy, only she couldn’t be. She was a girl, and her glasses were wrong. But she had Daddy’s smile, and his overbite, and she seemed so nice.

The photo had tear stains on it, and something was written on the back, but whenever she asked Mommy or Also-Mommy about it, they just said it was an old friend who was gone, and Daddy got scary quiet when she asked him. Someday, though, she’d learn to read, and learn what Daddy had written on the back. Or maybe it was Mommy or Also-Mommy.

She flipped further through the photo album. Daddy with someone who he called Grandpa, who wasn’t around anymore, and Also-Mommy with someone called Grandma, and pictures of other trolls like Mommy who weren’t around anymore. Anna wondered what had happened to them, but everybody refused to answer. Maybe she’d learn when she got older. But for now, curiosity could wait. After all, this afternoon was baking with Daddy. And no four-year-old could ask for anything more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _A long, long time ago  
>  I can still remember how that music used to make me smile.  
> And I knew if I had my chance, that I could make those people dance  
> And maybe they'd be happy... for a while..._

**Author's Note:**

> And a further I'm Sorry, because this has led me to write even more Sadist Jade stuff. Which will be condensed into this one story.


End file.
